Sanguis Vita Est
by Shigure-san
Summary: [DRACOxHarry, VAMPIRE!Draco] Whilst Voldemort's prisoner, Draco is made a vampire and forced to drink Harry's blood. Exploding with rage at what he now is, he helps Harry to kill Voldemort. But once back at Hogwarts, Draco finds himself addicted to Harry's blood.
1. 1- The Cold Stranger

**Title:** Sanguis vita est

**Author:** Shigure-san  
**Rating:** 18+ (Suitable for Mature Readers Only)  
**Pairings:** Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter  
**Warnings:** Abuse, Anal, Angst, Bad Language, Blood, HJ, Male Homosexual relationships, Slash, Oral, Rim, Violence, Graphic Lemon/Lime (scenes of a sexual nature) and most importantly _Vampire sex!_

**Disclaimer:** I do not own ANY trademarks of 'Harry Potter'. They belong to J.K. Rowling and Warner Bros. and others who aren't me. I merely own this story which I make no money from.

**Summary: **Whilst Voldemort's prisoner, Draco is made a vampire and forced to take Harry as his first meal. With Draco managing to resist the temptation to drain him, just barely, in a moment of blind rage at what he has been forced to become, he aids Harry in the destruction of Voldemort. But even with that threat vanquished, once back at Hogwarts, Draco finds himself disturbingly addicted to Harry's blood. And amongst all this, a dark shadow looms ominously on the outline of the forest, watching them closely.

**Author's Note: **_Sanguis vita est: Blood is life._ This is a vampire!Draco story and also an 'Eighth year' story, but I aim to put my own twist on both, as with me, angst and sex plague the plot and nothing is ever simple. Love/Hate is my one true love with stories, so expect the transition for Harry and Draco into lovers to be rocky. I don't do 'and they immediately fall in love' stories. I hope you enjoy this as much as I enjoyed writing it. I should update once a week I think since it's all written out and I'm just editing it through.

**Please note this is the censored version (no sex is shown and will be cut out). To read the sex scenes please visit the links on my profile page.**

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.: THE COLD STRANGER :.

A burning, uncontrollable inferno burst through his lungs, as he gasped for breath. His fingers scrambled, biting into the side of the basin he was being shoved face-first into. He screamed as pain ripped through his body at the repetitive starvation for air, his entire body tensed, struggling to remain upright, struggling to fight the control of the enemy trying to submerge him once more. He had already lost count of the number of times they'd done it today alone.

Today, yesterday, the day before…

He'd lost count of how many days he'd been their favourite toy in the dungeon, how many different tortures they'd exorcised on him.

He felt white-hot agony tear through his chest with every panting breath, as if the thick, unforgiving talons slicing into his sides were ripping into his ribs as well. He cried out, steeling his jaw against the desire to whimper, growling instead, trying to keep what remain of his pride, what remained of his life.

Behind him, the monster with his claws lodged in him, chuckled darkly.

"Such a handsome, proud little boy you were. Pure and white," the creature growled, "Now look at you…" The claws lodged in his sides were suddenly torn free and Draco gave a low, spluttering gasp. Blood splattered across his front and he winced, not daring to look down. He knew four huge gaping claw tracks had been carved into his sides, just like the angry red scars across his chest.

A flash of light, a memory from his 'old life' reached him. He was a boy sitting on his mother's knee, watching her plait her gorgeous hair. "Malfoys are beauty and perfection, Draco," she purred lovingly. "That is what we are. That is all we are." He shuddered now at his mother's words. He was no longer beautiful, no longer perfect, and every death eater that tortured him knew that stung more than any wound or torment.

It meant he wasn't a Malfoy anymore. Wasn't his mother's son, his father's heir…

Suddenly, those bloody talons seized his dirt-ridden blond locks and shoved him, without warning into the stone bowl once more. He inhaled the vile water, choked on it until his head swam with agony and he felt himself drifting. Then, just as the promising darkness reached him those claws yanked him back out, into reality. Again and again.

"You thought you were too good to let the Dark Lord sully your pretty little body, hmm?" The brute snarled in his ear, raising a bloody claw to Draco's right cheek, just to the side of where his eyebrow ended. He tapped it menacingly. And Draco flinched. _Not my face, _he winced, wondering how his mother, if they ever got out of this, would ever be able to look at him if they ruined the one thing he was good for…

He was vain and arrogant and proud, and his tormentors – this one, Fenrir Greyback in particular, took pleasure in ripping it all away. One layer of skin at a time…

"You don't get it, do you, _boy_?" Greyback barked, pressuring the claw so Draco set his jaw again against screaming in the flash of pain. "Wussy little faggots like you _don't _say no to the Dark Lord, not unless they're strong enough to back it up. Or have someone stronger to hide behind!"

Draco spluttered at last. Days, weeks, months, he didn't know how long he'd suffered this, but he was crumbling, breaking apart as that claw tore a neat, bloody gash down his face. He screamed. "NO!" He cried out, pathetic, weak, he didn't care. "STOP! I'll do what you want! Just stop it!"

His eyes flared with agony as tears rolled down his wounded cheek, salt reaching the gash. He cried again, catching sight of the prisoner that had been chained to the wall since yesterday through a veil of tears. He'd been forbidden to be touched by anyone but the Dark Lord, and Draco had been…too engaged before to take notice him, but now he did. And he could _taste _the despair mix with blood in his throat.

Large, green eyes stared down at him, Harry _bloody_ Potter, stared down at his broken, miserable self, shamed, naked, ruined…

"Seen your dinner have you?" Greyback chuckled darkly, seizing him by the hair and dragging him to his feet. Draco's legs trembled from the weight of his own body but that didn't matter, he was ripped across the room by his hair only to be thrown to his knees before Potter. His body slumped from exhaustion as well as shame.

The door to the side opened but he was too weak to even lift his head to see who had been invited in to take a chunk out of his soul. He swayed weakly where he knelt, not able to stop himself from flinching as something was thrown to the icy stone before him. It took him a moment to recognise the sound of chains clinking together, the sound of ragged breath and a body under stress as it tried to right itself.

Eventually, Draco forced his head up a fraction, just enough so that he could see Potter kneeling before him through his dirty, matted curtain of blond hair. They were so close their knees were touching and he grinded his teeth together as he forced his head up a fraction more to meet those eyes. Green and vibrant and untouched by the rot of this place, they shone in the dimness, furious and yet desolate at the same time. He saw Potter fight the bonds of chain around his wrists. That was a sign, Potter hadn't been here long, else he would've been too weak to need chains to prevent his escape. Like Draco…

"…The fair one," came Greyback's bark of a voice, and Potter looked up just as Draco dropped his head again, the last of his strength failing. He was resigned to his fate, he had been stripped of all life, all that remained was to be stripped of his existence and he could rest in peace. Potter's presence was not the torturous beacon of hope they might've hoped to use to torment him. Then Draco froze.

Greyback had suggested Potter was his…dinner?

Before he could process the possibilities, the hair at the back of his neck was seized roughly and his head jerked back so that he was forced to look into Potter's eyes. He gasped in pain, blinking as he felt Potter's musky breath on his cheeks. What were they planning?

A wretched shudder coursed through him when a hard, cold body pressed in behind him. It was _too cold, _too swift and precise and graceful to be Greyback and the smell spiralling up through his nostrils, it was so sweet it made him light-headed. "Hmm," a long, low purr sounded against his ear, making his back straighten in anticipation of pain. Instead, a slow lick up the side of his throat, just under the ear the cold stranger was breathing into made him hiss with pleasure.

Despite the coolness of that mouth, a heat unparalleled in this universe sped through his veins, like a swelling, icy inferno in his core. Despite his weakness, he tried to turn his head away, but the hand that had gripped his hair slid round to grip his head just under his jaw, on the opposite side to where that mouth was tormenting him. It forced him to look at Potter, even as his body jerked weakly. His breath was coming out in frantic pants now, panic surging in his gut. He was torn between longing for death and the end of this torment and the longing for the completion of the ecstasy burning through him. He cried out again quietly, the sound pathetic and shameful to his ears.

To his credit, Potter didn't wince, didn't turn away in disgust. On the contrary, he held his gaze firmly, his face hard as if he were trying to _will him _some of his own strength to survive whatever he was about to endure. _Ever the martyr, Potter, _his mind hissed, just as that cold mouth opened a little, hovering over the throbbing pulse in his throat.

"Yessssssss," the cold stranger purred, "the fair one indeed. He is ripe with self-loathing and hopelessness, so wretched and tormented." Draco shifted restlessly, wanting. Wanting an end, wanting more more, his body and mind longed for two different things. Sweat beaded his brow now, his skin aflame. The cold stranger, the man chuckled against his pulse. "Yes little one, my saliva is designed makes your pulse frantic, your blood blush and surge, just for my pleasure, my _appetite._" With that, two sharp points pressed firmly on Draco's throat, but not hard enough to break the skin.

"Stop!" Potter snarled, his shackles rattling as he rose up on his knees, struggling as if to break free and slaughter them with his bare hands. Draco, too drugged on that scent, that coldness, that _saliva _on his throat did not even blink, just stared dazedly at the Boy Who Lived, fighting for _his _life. "Take me! I'm stronger than him! Drink my blood! He'll die!" Potter insisted.

"That's exactly my aim," the cold stranger murmured.

"Sit down and wait your turn, Potter," Greyback growled, seizing the hair at the back of Potter's neck roughly and yanking him back into his position in front of Draco. Potter hissed out a curse but remained still under the threat of the werewolf's meaty fist, helpless as he watched the cold stranger, the _vampire _give him a final, fascinated glance before sinking his fangs into Draco's waiting throat.

Pain burst in Draco's throat briefly, before the pleasure swamped his body. He groaned in hapless ecstasy, his body going limp as the cold stranger drank from him. And all the while Potter's brilliant, green gaze stared into him, watched his body quiver and his mouth move with little pants of need. The cold hand not holding his head in place swept up over his naked, heaving chest, dancing over his sweat-slicked skin like a lover's caress, goosebumps rising over his skin in its wake.

"Isn't that pretty?" Greyback's voice registered in Draco's hazy brain but the words seemed nonsense to him with this red-hot bliss making his mouth water. "The Malfoy heir, a whore for death," the werewolf chuckled darkly, tightening his grip on Potter's hair as the boy snarled and struggled. "Doesn't it just make you hard, _Potter_? Watching him panting like a blood-stained bitch in heat? He was dizzy and weak with blood-loss and pain a second ago but it doesn't stop him taking it like a slut, hmm?"

"Take my blood instead!" Potter demanded hysterically, his voice raw. "He can't take anymore! He's_ dying_!"

Suddenly, those fangs ripped free of Draco's throat, tearing a gaping hole in his throat and a scream of absolute agony from his lips. The haze of pleasure was still there but now a river of blood was cascading down his torn body, his body cold and trembling. _Dying. _Draco spluttered and choked, his hands flying up to his wounded throat, tears spilling over his lashes in thick rivulets.

Potter's eyes widened then and panic surged anew in Draco's chest. What had Potter seen that was evidently more horrifying than him dying slowly from having his throat ripped out right before his eyes? He found out, when the cold stranger's free arm slid up, blood oozing unnaturally slow from his wrist.

"Drink it, my little fair one," the cold stranger purred in his ear. Draco's tongue swept across his lips nervously, and he tried to shake his head in negation, but the grip on his jaw rendered him immobile.

"N-No. _No_!" Draco gasped, his voice husky from his prior screams. Another, low chuckle against his ear making his stomach churn.

"It wasn't a request, fair one," was the only reply he got, before that wrist was smashed against his lips. Draco clamped his mouth shut, the vampire's wrist pressing against him with bruising force, but then the hand holding his jaw slid up a fraction, those nails slicing into the bleeding gash Greyback had gouged into his cheek. And Draco's mouth flew open in a scream, the vampire's bloody wrist sliding into place.

Blood swamped his mouth and he had no choice but to swallow or choke, but as soon as he swallowed, he wished he was dead.

The vampire's bite was a kiss of pure, unadulterated pleasure, but its blood was like drinking live electricity. It fried the blood in his veins, cell by cell, spreading through his organs like acid, killing him slowly, slowly. He screamed bloody murder, his body shaking with spasms as it died. Then, suddenly, everything stopped. His heart rate dropped, so slow it was barely moving, his body went cold, his mind went blank and his skin paled dangerously until his lips were blue. Eyes blind, hearing dulled, taste and touch, all faded by the fire in his blood.

He was vaguely aware of movement, of noise, even the throbbing agony in his body and the dryness to his insides, as if their life and moisture had been sucked up by a drought. Then, his senses came alive with a scream of pain from in front of him. His eyes widened, his vision bursting back with a flash of white, his tongue lolling in his mouth and his ears picking up the rapid thumping of a human heart. His body arched as the smell of rich, coppery blood reached his nose, whisking up his nostrils and feeding the flames still burning inside. He was still cold, still in pain, but not his stomach churned with an unnatural, insatiable hunger for the blood he could smell.

Blood. He knew it was blood because that was all that mattered, the only thought he could process. He panted at the delicious smell, his body quivering with need. Fingers still had hold of him, as strong as any chains and he longed to shake them free so that he could reach that d'orderve, that _feast _he sensed right under his nose.

His vision was back, but it was hazy and unnatural. The world was black and white, glowing, like he was on an ethereal plain, everything in greyscale except that vibrant trail of thick, delectable blood that oozed from the deep gash across the cheek of the creature before him. _That_ was the richest crimson, shining and beckoning him in. He vaguely recognised that the creature whose heart was fluctuating close to him, whose breath touched his own stinging cheeks, whose eyes stared into him imploringly, but that was not important. Nothing was as important as that blood and he let out a low, pitiful whine of longing for it.

Suddenly, the iron grip on his torso and head were released, so abruptly that he swayed warningly for a moment before catching himself. The foul-smelling canine thing holding his prey stepped away also and Draco barely registered a low chuckle of amusement as he edged forwards. The body before him was stiff with fear, pride and anger and…_sadness?_

Draco tasted the salt of it on his breath and his brow furrowed. Prey should be just the right amount afraid and aroused, shuddering with both, with longing but never sadness. Something in his churning, starving gut knew that, somehow. He leant in closer, considering the rigid body and realising he must've been chained to remain in such an awkward position, arms behind his back so firmly. No matter, for Draco's hand slid behind that neck, tugging him forwards by it so that that body arched into him subtly. His fingers slid up into dark locks and he crooned softly at how perfect the hiss of pain was that left those blood-flushed lips.

So close now, he could _feel _the vibrations of that heartbeat against his own chest, the violent heat of that flesh against his cold hand. He could smell so much fire, _life _in this creature. He wanted it, more than he wanted the inferno in his organs to stop. And somehow, he knew that the taking of this beauty's fire would extinguish his own pains. His tongue reached out, dancing along that gash on Potter's cheek. He growled softly at the tang of that blood on his tongue, his head spinning, his body _pleading _for more, more crimson water to quench his unnatural thirst.

"M-Malfoy, you don't have to do this!" That was a low insistent hiss from his prey and Draco tilted his head a little. Yes, he knew this sweet-tasting morsel, but all he was concerned about was that he wanted more of him and that he couldn't take it while he was rigid and unyielding. Something in him knew to make the body supple and limp as a kitten in its mother's grasp.

The gash had healed with his saliva, but it was not a main artery anyway and he couldn't drink from it effectively. No. Instead, he nosed the flesh he had just licked softly, tongue darting out to lap at the little splatters of blood left from the initial cut. But when his tongue touched the corner of the boy's mouth, he gasped, heat radiating from him in thick, intoxicating waves.

Draco smirked. Following the line of that mouth, he traced the shape with the very tip of his tongue and that body shuddered in response, arousal, Draco could smell it on him as potent as the sadness that clung to those lashes. He pressed in, free hand sliding around to the small of the creature's back, holding him so that they were flush together. Were he human, were he capable of thinking in terms of anything other than this burning thirst, he might've been embarrassed that he was still naked, as it was, the arousal in his little meal only made the blood pound faster and he tilted the boy's head more, exposing that delectable column of throat.

With an appreciative groan, he mouthed the honey-hued flesh, allowing his fangs to graze the pulse. He had to get the blood to the surface, get it pounding with a need to rival his own get the most satisfaction. He _knew _this. Suckling lightly on that frantic, pounding vein, he felt his own saliva make the body beneath him hotter, the blood faster, surging beneath the flesh as if waiting to burst into his mouth like a juicy truffle.

"Malfoy!" His prey gasped against him, the telltale hardness of his prick pressing into Draco's own crotch, which was hard from want of that body as well as the fluid rushing through it. "Malfoy, d-don't! You…you remember me. I'm… I'm _Potter, _Harry Potter. You're Draco Malfoy, you…you go to school with me, you fought with me. Your mother is Narcissa Malfoy, your father is Lucius Malfoy." His voice was hasty and desperate, verging on panic but his skin was as supple as silk under his influence. Under the drug of his saliva.

"Y-You're Severus Snape's favourite student!" His prey insisted, trying to remain lucid with everything that he was, it seemed, by his husky, distressed voice. "I punched you in the face once! You kicked me in mine, broke my nose. My best friend calls you 'ferret', I…I nearly killed you with a spell in the girl's loo last year! Malfoy! We were both put here by Voldemort! You can come back to yourself, you don't have to–!"

Then, his prey was silenced by his fangs sinking into his throat. Pleasure burst through Draco's body as blood flooded his mouth. His dry, rotten organs renewed, a pale glow filling his cheeks and power pulsing through every limb, right down to his toes, which curled as he leant into his prey for more.

The body under his thrall was limp, skin soft and yielding, but those arms were still struggling for freedom from their chains, that mouth still moving with pleas for recognition instead of being inebriated with ecstasy. He sucked a little more softly but allowed more of his intoxicating venom to ride down his fangs, hoping to lull his victim into surrendering to the mind-blowing sensation with their aphrodisiac properties. Groaning at the rich taste still, Draco nuzzled into the dark hair, riding the sheer bliss out.

"M-Malfoy…s-stop! Y-You're…you aren't a murderer. You…you can't kill me." The words barely made sense to him, but the soft husky voice made his blood-high soar. "D-D-Draco!" Potter screamed. And then it hit him, as hard and fast as the blood on his tongue. Potter. Harry bloody Potter. Draco's eyes cleared, the fog of animalistic, primal desire was swept away and he stilled in his sucking.

"M-Malfoy?" Potter panted, obviously sensing the change. Draco's stomach churned at the thought of drinking blood, at the memory of guzzling it down like a pint of water. He shuddered, his hands coming to rest on Potter's shoulders. With the primal hunger gone, he wasn't quite as in touch with his instincts anymore and didn't quite know how to disengage from Potter without hurting him.

"What's the matter, fair one?" The cold stranger purred from the distance. "He is your first meal, no one tastes better to you than him, he is yours to take, to rape, to kill. Can you not sense his lust? _Take him! _Kill him!"

Draco's stomach lurched. He swore he was going to gag. A vampire, he was a _vampire_! Could vampires even _be _sick? He wished to Merlin he could retch up Potter's blood now and curl up. He wished his organs had rotted away instead of being revitalised on nearly draining Potter dry.

Potter.

Perhaps it was his new condition, but he realised he had been unnaturally still now for a good few minutes, with his fangs the only thing stopping the flow of blood from the pinpricks he'd made in Potter's throat. Slowly, with all the delicacy and accuracy this disease gave him, Draco lifted his head slightly until his fangs were free of Potter's throat. Potter shuddered, as if he'd been tickled more than bitten, proving Draco's care had paid off. Draco paused, blinking as he dimly recalled lapping at the gash on his school-rival's cheek. Before he had even really contemplated _doing _it, his tongue had swept out and closed the punctures.

Potter gasped, toppling back slightly now he was free, staring at him with wide, hazy eyes. His mouth opened as if to speak, but the cold stranger's hiss of displeasure cut short his words.

"You _fool_!" He hissed, launching forwards and seizing Draco roughly, nails biting into the blond's shoulders. "You must _always _drain your first! _Always _unless you–!"

A bone-chilling roar filled the room, ricocheting off the stone as Draco flew at his sire, fangs bared, blood staining his body. He didn't care about his nakedness, he didn't care about his slowly healing wounds that had been inflicted by Greyback. He didn't care about Potter, or Voldemort, all he cared about was this monster that had raped his body and stolen his humanity. His pure blood, the only thing he had left after…

His nails, hard as diamonds stabbed into his sire's flesh, his body pinned him to the wall and he screamed out his agony. He swore he felt the stone tremble with the sound. "You turned me! You made me a monster! A vampire! A _vampire_! I'll kill you!" He spat, raising his arm, but just as he did Greyback lunged for him. And the door flew open, Lord Voldemort framed in the doorway.

"Two of the world's most feared creatures, unable to incapacitate two adolescent boys," Voldemort sneered derisively, striding confidently into the room, his wand arm outstretched, and turning on Harry. Leaving a ravenous Draco scratching and clawing at the cold stranger. Greyback stepped away from both with a seething snarl, understanding Voldemort's implied actions. Stranger was to be left to deal with his spawn himself. If he could not do that without help, he was unworthy of life in Voldemort's eyes.

Voldemort turned on Potter then, on the boy chained on his knees, splattered with blood but with no visible wounds as he glared up at him.

"Such fire, Harry," Voldemort chuckled darkly, pressing his wand into the boy's chin and forcing his head up so that he could stare uninhibited into those obstinate eyes. "You glare at me so, even as you sway from blood-loss and agony?" the Dark Lord breathed venomously.

Harry wrenched his face from that grasp, his eyes darkening, his hands clenching in his chains, skin burning with the way he _willed _his magic to break him free of this.

Suddenly, from the corner of the room, there was a blood-thirsty screech, inhuman in pitch and Harry's head whipped to the side, watching with wide, horrified eyes as Draco… No. Whatever Draco had become guzzled at his sire's throat before wrenching his head back, ripping the demon's throat out in one, swift movement. A vile snarl of fury left Malfoy's lips as he spat the bloody matter on the floor.

Reaching up, Malfoy tore the burning torch from the wall above where he had pinned his sire. The blood he'd taken from Potter had made him that much stronger in that instant. Strong enough to land a stalling blow to his sire and that was enough to give him time to end him. The body in his grasp was hard as stone but it was dead, dead even for a vampire. _And he will stay that way, for what he has done, _Draco thought, gaining a glimpse of conscious thought back as he thrust the shaft of the torch into the demon's chest, with a force so brutal it pinned the vile creature to the wall, like a dead insect in a glass case.

Harry felt bile rise in his throat where he knelt, his jaw dropping, his belly churning in repulsion of what he'd seen. He winced, and then that wand was at his throat again, shoving his head back so hard Harry cried out in pain.

"Only me, Harry," Voldemort demanded, "you will look only at me. You will look right into my eyes as I kill you. I had hoped to watch your old school friend rip your throat out but since he denied me the pleasure…" With that, his wand arm raised.

Everything happened in slow motion then.

Harry's entire body tensed for the blow, he was sure Voldemort wouldn't take the chance on him now, wouldn't mess around with lesser curses and give him opportunity to escape. After all, the only reason he had been captured so easily was because he had _wanted _to be found, had wanted to end it now. He had charged into the fray recklessly in search of Voldemort to end him once and for all now the horcruxes were gone, but now he couldn't see the way to turn the tables.

A fiery flash of green glowed at the tip, on the cusp of casting, on the cusp of ending Harry's life. His entire body throbbed with agony, his vision blurring from the blood-loss. That wand came down with the shape of the spell, aiming square between his eyes. A harsh, brutal laugh ripped from the Dark Lord's lips, the slow syllables of the death sentence rolling over his tongue.

Then, suddenly, a chilling snarl filled the air. Harry wished he could close his eyes, he felt his skin quiver at the sound. The biting laughter of his enemy was cut short, strangled by a scream of agony and Harry watched as Malfoy launched himself onto the Dark Lord's back, sinking his fangs into the monster's throat.

Malfoy winced as blood rushed over his tongue. His nails, hard as diamonds sank into Voldemort's chest, keeping his grip. The blood tasted vile, like drinking liquefied dirt. Surely blood was blood? Surely Potter's should taste no different to the Dark Lord's? His eyes narrowed then as the taste sharpened in his mouth, acidic and rotten. The taste of dying. But he held on, determined to make this brute pay for what he had made his family endure, for the family home he had tarnished with blood, for his childhood, lost to his reign. Revenge for allowing that icy corpse to steal his humanity, his _perfection _all because he had refused to be his catamite_. _

Malfoy turned his gaze on Potter as he tore the holes in Voldemort's throat wider, not drinking, allowing it to cascade over his body, staining his crisp robes. Potter was still kneeling there, still watching as if this were all a bad dream. Not sure how much longer he could hold this monster, Malfoy gave an urging, growl. Potter looked into his eyes then, blinking, his tongue darting over his lips, hesitating.

Malfoy's stomach clenched at the sight, _wanting _like never before, desperate for another taste, the foul flavour under his mouth the only thing anchoring him to what must be done.

Why was Potter hesitating?

Finally, as if slapped into reality, Potter launched himself upwards, ramming his shoulder into the Dark Lord's hand and knocking the wand from his grasp. Voldemort howled, Draco tore the gaping wound in his throat wider. Potter rolled onto his side, snatching the wand up with his bound hands and turning it, frantically muttering the spell to eradicate his bounds.

Draco felt the Dark Lord's magic surge beneath him and he willed his own magic to his aid, his fangs and nails rooting deep in evil flesh to hold him, just a moment longer. _Just a moment, _he insisted, and his revenge would be as sweet as the blood he had stolen from Potter's veins…

Harry scrambled to his feet the second the chains fell away, turning the wand on Voldemort, the world still moving in slow-motion, Harry stared into those blood-red eyes, every death this monster had created flashing before his eyes. His tongue swept over his lips again. His arm trembled.

Draco tore his mouth free then, ripping a chunk of flesh with him.

"Do it, Potter!" Draco snarled.

Voldemort tensed, reaching back in that moment of distraction and throwing Draco across the room. The newborn vampire slammed into the wall, falling forwards onto his hands and knees. He jerked his head up just in time to see Voldemort undone. He saw Potter turn the wand on its master, a vibrant, dazzling light bursting from the end of his wand.

"_Priorae Incanvore_!" Harry cried, with all the conviction, all the desperation and confidence that made him Harry Potter. Draco's eyes went wide as the light swelled with heat, with a fiery brightness to rival the sun. He was thrown flat against the wall with the strength of it. The glistening blue light swallowed Voldemort whole, his screams ricocheted off the walls, shrill and piercing as the smell of fear and sizzling skin filled the air.

Focusing his heightened senses then, Draco swore that in that prolonged moment, he saw faces, _bodies _in the light, incorporeal and vague, but definitely visible to his sharp, vampire eyes. The faces were drawn as if in agony, like zombies, but they screeched with otherworldly delight as they clawed at the Dark Lord's body, searing his flesh from bone wherever they touched. What made his already icy blood churn in his veins was that he recognised them, recognised some of the hundreds of faces. The Potters, Charity Burbage, his teacher he had been forced to watch die, dozens of death eaters he had sat beside at the gatherings…

These were all of the people Voldemort had killed, all of them exacting their revenge, tearing his flesh from his bones, burning him to a crisp. And those screams, they were their last cries, Draco realised, the noises they had made as they died, being played over and over again until he saw blood leaking from Voldemort's ears.

"I…I CAN…NOT _DIE_!" Voldemort screamed, his voice a gurgling, sickening howl of anguish. "A BOY!" He cried, and if his eyes had not been devoured in their sockets Malfoy was sure he would have seen the evil wizard crying with the sheer pain. "He was just a boy! I AM LORD VOLDEMORT!" And with that his tongue burned with the rest of him. The light swelled again and Draco swore he heard a female voice screaming, _"Please! Not Harry! Kill me, not Harry! Have mercy!" _Draco flinched at the blinding light then, a final flash dying with that sound, leaving a pile of smoking, revolting ash lying in the middle of the dim dungeon.

Draco's body slumped. His head bowed to his chest and his brain began to process everything that had happened in the last few minutes. He was a vampire. He could feel the thirst clenching in his belly even as Potter's blood was warm and rich inside, keeping his cold heart pumping lethargically. His skin had become a touch warmer, his heart a touch stronger as he had devoured that blood, and Voldemort's blood, although it was surely the same as Potter's, felt as nutritional as dust to him. At the memory of Potter's rich, sweet blood, his tongue swiped across his lips, encountering his bloody fangs in the process.

A frown creased his brow as he tasted Voldemort on them still and he winced as he touched a point to his tongue. They were sharp. His mouth felt awkward with them extended, as if he couldn't fully seal his lips, or even stop the saliva from drizzling from his lips while he salivated over the memory of how Potter had tasted…

_What have they done to me? _he wondered, aghast, drawing his knees up and burying his face in his hands as despair clawed at his throat. Voldemort was dead, _finally _dead, gone forever, he had _helped _to rid the world of him, and all he could think about was Potter's blood? He, Draco was a vampire, was _ruined_, was a monster, a _thing_. He was scarred, impure, imperfect and all he could think about was the saccharine taste of Potter's throat.

_Is that all that will ever matter to me now? Blood? Carnage? I cannot even weep for my lost life, for the disgust that I will see in my own mother's eyes when I am reunited with her, because I am already mourning the loss of Potter's taste…_

His hands clenched, his nails digging into his hair, blood weeping from his skull into his eyes. He did not care.

Across the room, the door flew open and Draco knew that Greyback was gone. Seconds later, the room was full of aurors, aurors fussing over Potter, over the pile of ash and the dead vampire pinned to the wall, completely oblivious to Draco's presence he was so still, so camouflaged thanks to his new body's power.

Potter was silent as he was questioned ruthlessly, however. At the back of his mind, Draco heard the words he was asked, but could not make sense of them, he did not care. Potter's footsteps approached him then, and the tendons in Draco's neck tensed in anticipation of the end. Potter would end him surely, he would end his suffering, kill him for being such a revolting, blood-thirsty thing.

_Yes, _Draco thought longingly. Potter had seen the way he had torn into the vampire and Voldemort, had _felt _Draco's insatiable, animalistic hunger when he had taken his own throat. _Potter will end me. _He was sure. And yet his expectations were dashed when he heard the flutter of cloth and felt Potter's tatty, common travelling cloak draped around his shoulders to conceal his nudity and preserve what remained of his shredded pride.

Slowly, Draco raised his head, staring up into those deep green eyes and the tumultuous thoughts reflected within. Potter held his gaze for a moment, speaking without words it seemed, before allowing himself to be tugged away by the Order. The werewolf Lupin and his mate by the smell of her, swirled Harry away, leaving Draco alone to the mercy of the Order of the Phoenix.

Potter had spoken up for him and his mother at the Wizengamot, of course. Thanks to Draco's aid in vanquishing the Dark Lord and Narcissa for calling the Order as soon as Potter had been captured, they were released with their good names cleared. Lucius was placed under confinement to the manor for three-and-a-half decades, with a restriction on his magic on everything but first year spells. But that was nothing compared to what they would have lost, had Potter not been such a noble, foolhardy Gryffindor. They had their lives back.

Despite the miracle of their freedom, Draco's pride was still broken, his world was still gone. He wasn't beautiful or perfect anymore. He wasn't Draco Malfoy anymore. Not his father's perfect heir, not his mother's precious son…

He hadn't even thanked Potter at the Ministry that day, had simply walked away from the courtroom without so much as a glance back.

Before a mirror in the grand entrance hall of Malfoy Manor Draco now stood. He adjusted his tie, even though the mirror gave him no reflection. He straightened his new school robes then, not daring to look into the mirror where his image _wasn't. _His scars from Greyback and the cold stranger may have faded, but he was still a monster, a _vampire._ Spoiled. That's what he was. And no matter how much his mother cried that he was still her beautiful boy, he couldn't believe it. He saw the revulsion in her eyes…

But he had to try regardless, he had to act the part of the superior, Malfoy heir for her. Had to try to make her proud, she deserved that much if she loved him enough to lie and tell him he was beautiful.

The students who would've been in seventh year at Hogwarts last year had been invited back for an 'Eighth Year' to complete their education that the war had ruined. Not everyone had agreed, not everyone was healed enough from the trauma, or had even _survived _to take the opportunity, but with Severus's help, Draco had. He would fight for his place again.

The only thing he had to offer before now was beauty and perfection, as his father had said. As the Dark Lord himself had said, and now that had been stripped away, he was just going to have to find something else, or try at least. It seemed a lost cause…

His mother, who had been surveying him silently from the stairs, hobbled over to lay a kiss on his cold cheek. Draco tensed but allowed it and then forced a smile as he bid her goodbye, following his floating trunk out of the manor. It seemed hopeless, a lost cause, but he was too afraid to give up, to die, too much of a coward to take the easy way and just fade into nothing. Just shut himself away. He had always been told he was so important, that he mattered and now it looked as if he _didn't…_he was scared to death that it was true. That he was nothing. Scared to death that's all he'd ever be…

He had a new year ahead of him, a chance to seize his life back, but he was terrified he wouldn't be able to. Terrified to be a failure.

His mask fell into place as he left his home, arrogant, conceited and stuck up as ever. No one could see that the war had touched him, no one could know that he was a vampire. _No one_. It had been kept quiet, the only person that knew outside of his parents and Severus was Potter and for some reason, the boy had kept quiet. But he knew he would not be allowed back at Hogwarts if the Headmistress knew what he was, if the students knew just what would be supplementing his usual diet this year. Draco winced, the taste of even the finest rats could not wash the lingering taste of Harry Potter from his tongue.

Draco shivered as he walked into the sunshine. He had Severus to thank for this miracle, he could not have done this when he was first turned. He felt the warmth on his cold skin. It even stung his eyes a little but he could suffer it quite well. What was insufferable was this unquenchable thirst, this unstoppable clenching in his gut, the fire in his veins and the longing for that delicious, coppery sweetness of Potter's blood. He knew he would have to keep away from Potter this year if he even stood a chance of not sinking his fangs into him in the middle of the classroom.

Harry sighed as he trailed quietly behind Remus, who was pushing his trolley, Tonks walking close by his side with baby Teddy in her arms. Platform nine and three quarters was busy despite the lack of students returning for 'eighth year'. As he understood it, only fourteen students from their year had agreed to come back, some dead, some afraid, some just…not able to face it. He could respect that. If he'd had something else to do with his existence he wouldn't have come back either. As it was, Hogwarts was his only home. That was the real reason he was coming back, selfish, pathetic but true.

They came to a halt as Remus loaded Harry's trunk onto the train and Harry's gaze wandered over to the little first year standing rigid under his mother's fussing, her hand carding through his hair affectionately, while the father pressed the child's owl-cage into his grasp. _"Take care of him," _the father said to the boy, tilting his head to the owl. Harry felt his chest tighten. He thought when Voldemort died all his problems would vanish like a slither of smoke. But he was still plagued by nightmares, guilt, still afraid of the powers Voldemort's death had imbued him with. _Still have nowhere to call home, _he thought.

"Wotcher, Harry," Tonks piped up, setting a hand on his shoulder. Harry turned slightly to find both her and little Teddy watching him with matching amethyst eyes and violet hair. "Your head was in the clouds, Harry." She followed the path of his gaze to the boy and his parents then, giving a sad smile. "Remus and I were thinking, perhaps for Christmas, we could scrape together enough to get you an owl. You must miss Hedwig awfully and of course, you'll need an owl of your own now you're heading back to school."

Harry tried to smile, not having managed it for a good few months now, not even when he realised Voldemort was finally gone. She had misinterpreted his staring, she couldn't know that her and Lupin's valiant efforts to make him feel at home in their new little cottage in the middle of (a flowery) nowhere in Essex. Siddlebury cottage was no bigger than Privet Drive and was a little shabby due to Lupin's lack of funds but it was warm and he was welcome there. _But you don't belong there, _the bitter, shadows of Harry's mind hissed. He wanted to, badly. He wanted to belong to Lupin and Tonks, but he couldn't help but feel he was a pity-lodger, a burden left behind by Lily and James Potter. He wasn't their son, wasn't theirs, not the same way little Teddy was.

Suddenly, his thoughts were cut short as Lupin returned to his side to pull him into a tight hug. Harry sighed, his body tense at first. _So ungrateful, _his mind spat. _They've done everything to make you feel at home, stop with this 'poor Harry' tripe!_

Hugging Remus back fiercely, Harry held on for a minute longer, before regretfully letting him go. He loved Lupin and Tonks, as much as he had Sirius, he just felt awkward around everyone these days, and he could not help but wonder if they regretted taking him in once they'd seen what a state he was in after the war's end. Killing Voldemort had left him a little empty, aching, a bitter shell of the boy he had been when he'd first come to Hogwarts. And Harry loathed himself for it.

"Say goodbye to Harry, Teddy," Tonks babbled, lifting Teddy off her hip and pressing him into Harry's arms. The five-month-old yawned widely, his big eyes staring up at Harry as he smiled around the fist he was chewing. Immediately, his hair grew darker to match Harry's and he gurgled softly. Harry smiled awkwardly. He'd always wanted a family but he wasn't quite sure how to act around babies just yet, particularly such a small, vulnerable one that wasn't his.

"See you at Christmas, Teddy," Harry said softly, kissing his head and handing him hastily back to Tonks. "See you at Christmas," Harry repeated, hugging Tonks and then Remus again. "I'll write. Don't worry about me, just take care of yourselves."

"That goes for you, too," Remus murmured with that same, warm smile. A familiar group of voices caused them all to look then and Harry blanched as Ginny Weasley gave him a contemptuous look before disappearing onto the train. It was a surprise to Harry that Hermione waited on the threshold of the carriage Remus had loaded his trunk into. But no sight of Ron.

"They'll come around, Harry," Remus reassured him, evidently having seen his face fall. "They've stuck by you through worse." Harry just nodded dumbly. He couldn't get his head round the fact that Ron was angry that he _didn't _want to sleep with his sister. But then, Remus was talking again, distracting him from his wonderings.

"Remember, Minerva has made special allowances for your year since you are technically adults, but with those privileges come responsibilities," Remus warned him, "And you can firecall us whenever you need to talk, don't forget that."

Harry nodded, giving them a final, forced smile before heading onto the train, walking straight past Hermione but feeling her following him quickly.

"The Weasleys love you, Harry, whether you're with Ginny or not, you _know _that you're like another son to them," Hermione leapt straight in, no small-talk necessary. Harry sighed, turning to face her.

"And you're telling me this, why?" Harry asked, his neck prickling oddly. He frowned, scratching at his throat absently as he stared at his friend. The wound had been a bit tender over the summer but it never ached like this.

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Ron can be…stubborn. You have to see it from his point of view, Harry. He had this image of it in that thick head of his, of his best friend and his sister, of you finally being his real brother. All of us a proper family. It's…it's hard for him to let it go, particularly as you didn't explain why you–"

"I don't have to explain myself," Harry seethed, jaw tight, that odd tingle still buzzing through his skin. He rubbed as his neck again, irritating the skin until it was red. Hermione winced, swatting his hand away.

"Do stop that, you're making it red-raw," she snapped. "And I never said you had to explain anything, I am merely _trying _to explain what Ron sees from his point of view. He sees his perfect world shattered for no reason. And that's not your fault, I just think that maybe if you were to tell him–"

"Ron's already made up his mind," Harry cut across her, leaning back against the window and closing his eyes. The train hadn't even left the station and already they were arguing, just as he had expected. "And you were with me, _both _of you on that Horcrux hunt. You should know better than anyone _why _I cant just pick up where we left off like Ginny thought we would, why I can't just to pretend to be who I was before. The war changed me, taking life changed me, I cant pretend it's all alright because it isn't!"

Hermione recoiled at his voice, and Harry saw some people leaning closer to the doors of their compartments to listen. He'd only given one interview of what had happened on his part, to the Quibbler, and had refused any contact from the media after that. It was no surprise they were as nosy as ever.

The itchy, tingling in his throat became unbearable then and Harry snarled in frustration, whirling around to check it in his reflection of the window. It looked red from where he'd been rubbing it, but aside from that it was normal, the same old golden-tinted skin and the same iridescent, almost circular scar that Malfoy's bite had left. He frowned, wondering if the pale scar was finally fading at last. He had tried ointments, potions, spells, even a glamour or two but nothing had affected it.

_A magical scar, _Remus had said, when he had caught him staring at it in the mirror. The werewolf had pointed to the old wounds marring his own face and smiled sadly. Remus most likely assumed Voldemort or Greyback had caused the wound, if only he knew.

"I wish you would tell me what type of curse they used on you to make that," Hermione said then quietly, startling him from his reverie, "I am sure if you told me, even the _colour_ of the curse, I could try and find something to get rid of it for you." Remus, Tonks, Hermione and the Weasleys had all asked about it, even the media, but Harry had simply turned a deaf ear. It wasn't his secret to tell, what happened that night. He knew that vampires were accepted in society on the whole, but he wasn't sure if Malfoy's condition would be greatly appreciated in a school full of students. So he had kept quiet.

"Not like I'm not already scarred, Hermione," Harry replied despondently, "I'll live, it's just another wound." He saw the pain whip across her face in her reflection then and his chest clenched tight with regret. "I'm sorry," he said, turning to face her, leaning against the window again. "I'm sorry, I know you only want to help me, I just…give me a while, yeah? It's only been a little while and I…I need time to get over this."

Hermione considered him a moment, her eyes glistening wetly but a smile touching her lips. She nodded slowly. "Of course, Harry. Just…don't shut us out. Ron's being a prat at the moment but we're here for you. Let's do this together, alright?"

Harry nodded, waving his wand to shrink his trunk and put it into his pocket. "I'll meet you in the compartment in a bit," he said, "Maybe you can butter Ron up for me before I join you?"

Beaming, Hermione gave him a swift hug before nodding and heading through to the next carriage. "Watch where you're going, Malfoy," Hermione hissed and Harry's head snapped to the side, just in time to see both of them stepping back from what looked like a slight collision. Hermione carried on up the carriage, Malfoy, however, paused on the threshold for a moment, before stepping closer. He shut the door behind him and then the one next to Harry, leaving them both alone in the cramped area between the carriages.

Stiffening in anticipation of an attack, Harry's hand slid down for his wand as Draco tugged the blind down over the window in the carriage door. He faced Harry fully then, his stormy grey eyes shining likes stars in the dimness. His skin was pale, but clear and smooth and a frown found Harry's face when Malfoy's lips quirked into a smile and there was no glimpse of the fangs that had scarred him.

"I never thanked you for what you did for me and my family at the Ministry, Potter," Malfoy said huskily, his voice rich and smooth like caramel. Harry raised his chin defiantly.

"No, too busy storming off like a pillock," Harry spat, feeling awkward. He had seen Malfoy in a pitiful state when he had first been 'captured' had seen him endure unimaginable torment, every strip of his beloved pride stripped away. He wasn't sure how he should look at him now. The man that had been with him in the dungeon that night deserved more respect, but the _boy _he was showing himself to be right now didn't. "I would've done it for anyone in your position, Malfoy. You helped me to take down Voldemort in that dungeon, I couldn't have done it without you."

Malfoy tilted his head a little, his blond locks falling into his dazzling eyes as he considered Harry for a moment. "You did it for me even though I ripped open your throat and drank your blood?" Draco asked, honestly curious, not understanding how Potter could have forgiven that.

Potter's eyes darkened and his hands tensed into fists. "You were mad with the change, it was a miracle you didn't kill me, I read a lot over the summer. About vampires. The thirst for your first is meant to be undeniable, yet you resisted."

The blond's lips curled in a sneer. "Don't make it sound so glorious, Potter. I ceased because I was repulsed with myself. I was disgusted with myself for guzzling at your throat, disgusted by being tainted. It made me sick to my stomach, that's the only reason I let you go." He caught sight of something then, and his dead heart thumped a little harder as he stepped closer, the smell of that blood he wanted surging up into his nostrils. He shivered involuntarily, his eyes locked on the sight of the pearly scar at Potter's throat.

"Rubbing one off with the scar, Potter? Surely you couldn't have enjoyed my bite that much that you're frustrated at the loss?" He growled huskily, the hunger churning in his stomach. Potter was alone, _helpless, _he could pin him here and take him and no one would know any different…

Harry snarled suddenly, shoving Malfoy back _hard _and reaching for his wand, holding it against the vampire's throat. "Don't presume that because I forgave your _weakness _that we're friends, that it's alright for you to joke with me, or _flirt _with me. I saved you and your family from Azkaban but that's it, I don't want repayment, I don't want to be your friend, I don't want to talk about something…something _personal _like that with you and I most certainly don't want your pity fuck or whatever it was I saw in your eyes just then."

Malfoy chuckled darkly, leaning his head to the side, for some reason wanting Potter to see how his flesh did not yield under the pressure of the wand, wanting him to see how strong it was. "Did it occur to you that I didn't come here to fight, Potter? I came here to thank you."

Potter's sneer grew, his eyes glowing with rage behind his glasses. "Did it occur to you that you're really crap at it?" Harry spat, pressing harder with his wand. "I just got out of a war, Malfoy. A war in which I was _our _side's number one weapon. Perhaps you might consider that before you delude yourself into thinking that I want _this_!"

Stepping closer, ignoring the sharp pinch of the wand in his throat, Draco smiled dangerously. The sound of that blood was flooding his ears, he could hear Potter's heart thudding rapidly, _smell _the faint hint of sweat to his musky scent. The memory of Potter's blood on his tongue flooded his senses. For that moment, his pride dissipated like water on the sun. His instincts surged like a beast at the bars of his cage, desperate for a taste of freedom.

Potter was freedom to him, an escape from this eternal hunger. The animal blood he drank did not sate him, Snape was researching, had even tested a few donated _human _blood samples but nothing had quenched his thirst as apparently one drink _should_. In the end, if he could not find some satisfaction when he fed, he would be driven mad by thirst. Everything he drank was as Voldemort's had tasted, like ash in his mouth…

Suddenly, the train lurched into movement, throwing both boys off their feet. Harry stumbled back onto the wall behind him, his arms flying out to save him uselessly and Malfoy fell forwards against him, effectively pinning him between his hard, heavy body and the wall.

Harry took a sharp in take of breath despite the pressure on his lungs.

"This?" Draco breathed, his cool breath dusting Harry's cheeks. "And what exactly is _this, _Potter?"

Harry growled warningly, before shoving Draco back hard again, keeping his wand between them. "Perhaps you should read about your own condition, Malfoy," he replied indifferently. "The way you're acting towards me, the reason you came to me, it isn't because you wanted to, it wasn't to say _thank you_. I don't want a pity fuck from a slave to his instincts and after being the wizarding world's _weapon _for the last seventeen years, I have no desire to be your whipping boy."

With that, Potter threw open the door and stormed off up the train after Hermione, leaving Malfoy to ponder his words.

Vampires did not need to breathe, but some freshly sired, like Draco, simply felt more comfortable allowing the habit to continue. He took a deep breath of air, composing himself and then his pride sank its fangs into his chest as his control flooded back. He had let the monster swamp his pure blood, everything that made him who he was. He winced at the thought of losing himself to the hunger, just as Snape had predicted. Turning and heading the opposite way to Potter, Draco made the conscious decision to raid the Library as soon as they arrived at Hogwarts. Evidently Potter knew more about the vampire's curse than he, he would just have to change that, especially if it led to a greater understanding of the monster he had become.

_If those cretins at the ministry had not stolen our family's archives I might have had a chance of understanding before Potter ridiculed me with my ignorance._

Taking a seat in the slytherin carriage, he kept to himself. He had made his decisions on what to do next, consult the library and then Severus, but he could not help but be plagued by the cold stranger's warning, icy words. They haunted his mind. _"He is your first meal, no one tastes better to you than him, he is yours to take, to rape, to kill. Can you not sense his lust? Take him! Kill him!" _Draco winced, his hands clenching into fists, nails biting into his palms as he tried to shut the memory out. Still it revolved in his head like a foreboding, cursed mantra. _"You fool! You must always drain your first! Always unless you–!"_

Unless what?

_~To Be Continued..._

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A/N: Priorae Incanvore [Pry-or-ay In-can-vor-ay] is a spell I made up. 'Priorae' meaning prior 'incan' derived from incantation and 'vore' which is a modified use of 'devour'. So in basic terms, the spell means to be devoured by prior incantations. Please do not use this/copy this in any way. Ask first for permission and credit me if you wish to use this. Thank you.

Much love and best wishes!

Shigure-san

(HyperLittleNori)

x chuu x


	2. 2- Temporentia Sensium

Author's Note:

**Important Story Note **for you to consider: **Temporentia Sensium**, is my own creation, so please do not steal. Ask if you wish to use or copy or adapt in any way shape or form and credit and link back to me accordingly, thank you. The name is derived from the latin Temperantia (self-control) and Sensus (senses).

_Ingredients: _Salamander blood, because it's used in strengthening solutions

Wit-sharpening potion as a base because it keeps one's wits together despite what is happening

Asphodel because it is traditionally associated with the afterlife and the underworld

Hellebore and moonstone, because they are ingredients in the Draught of peace, which soothes anxiety.

Anyway enough facts, on with the story! Please leave a review if you have the time, thank you!

**Please note this is the censored verson (no sex is shown and will be cut out). To read the sex scenes please visit the links on my profile page.**

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.: TEMPORENTIA SENSIUM :.

The welcoming feast was much the same as ever, Harry thought as he prodded at his mashed potato, scooping it into a small pile before shoving some in his mouth. The same hall, same faces, except that the 'Eighth Years' had procured their very own (smaller) table that had been squeezed in near the front of the hall. There was nothing wrong with that, except that when they had all made their way into the hall, they had had longer to walk, a greater amount of time for all eyes to study them as if they were a heard of first years.

Harry kept his eyes down, _feeling _their eyes on the back of his head while he ate. But also, he sensed a particular, _inhuman _gaze riveted to his every bite. Malfoy was a few seats away from him granted, but not far enough given what he had tried to pull on the train earlier…

"If you duck your head any lower you'll be face-first in the gravy," Hermione murmured in his ear and Harry straightened up a little, just in time to see Ron look away from him. Harry tried not to let the hurt touch his face as he focused solely on Hermione. Ron was speaking to him again, but it was strained and awkward.

"It's ten time worse now, the _staring, _I wish they'd find fascination with someone else," Harry replied, rubbing at his neck as it twinged uncomfortably. He couldn't help but wonder if it had something to do with Malfoy – it _was _exactly where his scar was, after all. _Maybe he's given me vampire rabies, _he mused, wondering if there even was such a thing.

"Got fleas, Potter?" A voice jibed and Harry looked up to see Zabini leering at him from the seat beside Malfoy. "Or just got an overzealous girlfriend?"

Harry flushed even as he glared back, hearing a disdainful snort from the side that was Ron. The slytherins had perfect timing as ever with the taunts. "If you got off your poncy arse and into the real world more often, Zabini, you'd know a scar when you saw one," Harry snarled, shoving away what was left of his meal and gulping down his pumpkin juice.

"I get out in the real world often enough to get laid, Potter, you might want to try it once and awhile," Zabini sneered, making a show of taking another eloquent bite from his own meal. "The way the Weasley bint tells it, you're still a dainty little virgin."

Harry saw red then as the hall fell silent to hear his humiliation. His body physically shook with rage and a breeze flew out of nowhere, whipping up his short dark locks and lapping at his steaming flesh. The table shook. He glanced up to see Headmistress McGonagall's eyes set on his, however, and managed to keep himself in the seat from the warning in her eyes. Her words from only fifteen minutes ago were still fresh in his mind.

The Eighth Year students were adults, they were to be settled in a separate dormitory arranged especially for them, they would have certain privileges but with those perks came responsibilities. They had to be on their best behaviour, major mess-ups (like a brawl before term even officially started) would end up with the sheer privilege of them being allowed to finish their education being withdrawn. None of them wanted that, even the slytherins. All of those who had had the guts to return had something to prove, had to make something of themselves and they needed Hogwarts to do that.

Remembering this just in time, Harry brushed the dark-skinned boy off, tucking into the bowl of ice-cream that had suddenly appeared before him. Mentally counting to ten. He'd spent all summer struggling to harness the sudden increase of power he'd been imbued with but hadn't had opportunity to test his control. He felt is shudder, stretch to its limit. But it held. _Just._ With a low sigh, he glanced up to see McGonagall giving him a soft smile. It figured, being head teacher meant prising choice students with sweet things, McGonagall seemed to have a knack for guessing their favourite ice-cream. He smiled back absently as he took his first bite, cookie dough was his favourite.

"Drop the house rivalry, Zabini," Hermione bit out from Harry's side, "there is no house segregation in 'Eighth Year'. We aren't on the quidditch teams, we can't even earn or lose house points. Perhaps it's about time you grew out of such childish enmity."

Zabini glared at her while beside him, Malfoy chuckled with mild amusement. "She has you by the brass balls with that one, Blaise," he mused, eyes flickering to Harry to try and garner his attention. Even a glimpse of those infuriated eyes, but the boy kept his head down, denying Draco a sight of them. "And if a good slytherin is known for anything, it's for adapting to chance in lieu of self-preservation." Blaise grunted in irritation at Draco not taking his side. Granger flushed and gave a rigid nod before looking back to Weasley, who was distinctively not looking at Potter. Potter, he hadn't even acknowledged the conversation had continued.

_Look at me, _Draco growled within the dark, echoing expanse of his mind. _Look at me, damn you. _He watched Potter twitch then and rub the scar on his throat again, but the boy did not look up. _Meet. My. Eyes. _He willed, his body deathly still and his cloudy gaze fixed intently. His first _would _look on him, he _willed him _do so!

Draco froze then. What was he doing? What was happening? It was as if something inside him, a primal desire had acted without his conscious permission. He swallowed back the heat in his cold throat then, tearing his gaze away from Potter as if to spite the vampire instincts and turned back to his cherry bakewell. He grinned lasciviously then, without thinking. It seemed Potter was still a cherry. Something thick and hungry in his belly liked that thought and his smile touched every muscle in his body. _Dead body, _he reminded himself bitterly, in an effort to quash the vampire's infuriatingly insistent wants.

_I am still Draco Abraxas Malfoy, _he insisted, smothering the vampire and its will, its pathetic desires for Potter's attention. _I am still me. I will not be changed by a monster's blood! _Abruptly he shoved his now empty plate away, rising to his feet without so much as a glance at the eyes watching him. They had been disclosed the location of the eighth year dormitory, but that was not where he was going. No. He needed information, he needed to acquaint himself with every tiny flaw and virtue of this _disease_, if only to learn to harness the vampire beneath his skin. Learn to conquer it. _If only to get the insatiable thirst for Potter out of your mouth, _his mind supplied. He hastened towards the library.

Harry sighed as he watched the light from the smouldering flames dance over the golden body of the snitch that hovered above him. The soft, regular fluttering of its wings calmed him, he found. He stared up into the golden globe of the magical instrument and lost himself in the potential freedom. He wasn't sure why it comforted him, an old trinket left behind by Dumbledore. He wasn't even sure why he had kept it now the war was over, all hallows aside from his cloak gone along with the horcruxes.

Perhaps it comforted him because it reminded him of a time where he had worth, where he had purpose, where he was ever-moving forward. Where he _meant _something more than baggage to those around him. Either way, with his temperament still unsteady from dinner, it helped so ease the inner battle of power trying to get out. Like a caged tiger waiting to be unleashed.

Turning his head to the side, he gazed into the fire glowing in the hearth. He was lying on the rich suede settee in front of the fireplace in the eighth year common room, flat on his back with his legs hanging over one of the arms. It wasn't that different from Gryffindor common room except the colours were mostly creams with rich gold detailing, and the location, of course, which was a brand new branch off the moving staircase that no first to seventh years could enter. _'For legal age reasons,' _McGonagall had said. If they wished to converse with the lower years, they had to leave their common room.

Not that Harry felt much like conversing with anyone. The common room was nearly empty except for a few, Ron and Hermione long having left him to his moping. Not that he blamed them. _Pull yourself together you sulky prat, _he spat at himself, studying the fluttering wings of the snitch as if it held the secrets to his escape from the abyss of depression he had stumbled into.

He winced as that burning itch resurfaced on the inflamed skin of his throat, and resolved not to rub it anymore.

Suddenly, the portrait hole opened and in instinct-reaction, Harry's eyes flicked in that direction, only to see Malfoy striding into the common room, surveying the richly decorated area critically. Harry scoffed and turned his gaze to the fire, the snitch's wings brushing over his cheek gently.

"Did you get lost, Malfoy?" Daphne Greengrass called over from the corner she was sitting in with Blaise Zabini. "Weren't you eager to see your new sleeping quarters with the gryffindors? Since there are only seven boys and seven girls we're all meant to share, it seems. Just one dormitory for the girls and one for the boys. How demeaning…"

Malfoy's gaze drifted to Potter, strewn across the settee, before he made his way across the room and towards the fire, dropping his heavy book-bag onto the floor beside the armchair closest to it. He kept his eyes off of Potter from then on, concentrating on warming his unnaturally cold body by the fire. He didn't _need _to be warm, but it was comforting nonetheless, especially in light of some of the things he had read in the library…

_I need to see Severus in the morning, _he thought, before swallowing. Forcing his throat and voice into action. "Consider yourself lucky that you were able to return this year, not all of us were so lucky, or did you not notice that our numbers have greatly depleted since we enrolled first year?" Draco murmured. He didn't like the way Blaise and Daphne were acting like they were still children, like nothing had changed when surely, any blind man could see. Everything had changed.

"Easy for you to say," Daphne sneered, "You are at least going to have Blaise at your back in your room…"

Draco closed his eyes against the stupidity, dropping his head into his hands. His fingers tightened around fistfuls of blond locks and he winced. He couldn't function properly. Not now he knew _this_ and had no one to turn to with it. "You'll find your way into his bed quick enough," he snapped, his fangs making his gums itch where they lay hidden, his teeth grinding. Why was the fire so noisy? Why was Daphne's voice so shrill?

Why could he hear Potter's blood thrumming through his veins?

_You know why, now, _his mind breathed. No, the _vampire _breathed.

Draco jerked back then, dropping into the armchair behind him, his nails digging into the fabric. "If after the war, after this second chance we've been given _all _you have to be concerned about is sleeping with a few girls that (rightfully) dislike you then I'd say you have it easy, Greengrass," He snarled, not daring to turn to face the other two slytherins, or Potter, who was listening intently now. Draco could _feel _his pupils dilated with hunger, _glowing _silver instead of their usual murky grey.

The emotions were running too high through his being, and the hunger cramps were twisting his insides into knots. He couldn't function, but he couldn't reveal himself either. No one could know what he was.

"You've come back a right self-righteous prat, Malfoy," Daphne huffed, leaping to her feet and flouncing off up the stairs (which Draco supposed lead to the dormitories). In contrast, Blaise rose slowly and Draco's unnatural senses let him know his once-friend was eyeing him carefully from across the room.

"You should be careful who you isolate yourself from, Draco," Blaise warned coolly. "You are going to need all the contacts you can to redeem you from your _shame_."

Like Potter had in the great hall at dinner, Draco anchored himself to his seat rather than launch himself at the boy who was making his way up the stairs also. His nails hooked in the fabric of the chair as if to ground him. If he attacked Blaise now, while he was this angry, he would, no doubt kill him _and _reveal himself in the same instance.

Then he realised. He and Potter were now alone in the common room. His skin tingled at the knowledge and his stomach clenched hungrily. Yes, he was starving and Potter was like a four-course meal under his nose. At least he knew why now…

_Not that it helps, _the vampire whispered. _You want him, you can smell how tasty he is…_

It was like he was hyperaware of Potter's every movement, every breath, he didn't even have to look at him to see his fist snatch the snitch out of the air and tuck it away in his pocket. He just knew when Potter sat up slowly, remaining still and upright for a moment or so, until he got to his feet. Perhaps Potter was leaving him in peace, allowing him a moment to beat back the swelling desire to open a vein and taste that blood. How on earth would he _'sleep' _with that smell clouding his judgement and senses?

It didn't matter right now, because Potter was moving – _toward _him, not toward the stairs.

"Don't come any closer, Potter. I've read up on a lot of things, and you really don't want to be near me right now."

The reason why everything tasted of ash except Potter, the reason why a mere waft of his shampoo sent his stolen blood pounding. Potter was his first, he was meant to have drained him dry that first night, thus completing, _finalising _his transformation into a vampire. But he had spared the chosen one, he had let him go and now that doomed him to a life – an _un-life_, of hunger and madness, unless he finish what he started and drain Potter dry.

Without the miniscule scraps of sustenance from Severus's experiments he would not have even survived the summer. Although this felt very unlike surviving. His stomach was churning, clenching, _burning _for something, _anything._

Despite his warning, Potter hadn't stopped. On the contrary, he was now at the side of the chair, staring down at him. Draco's knuckles went white with tension. It hurt so badly to resist. How much easier it would be to just reach out and end this? Potter was so lost in his own self-loathing he probably wouldn't even struggle…

"I mean it, Potter, piss off," he hissed. Still the obstinate boy remained and Draco snapped his head up to turn his vampiric glare on the chosen one's face. Those eyes, they were shining like emeralds in the firelight and the depth of emotion that glistened there almost made him choke on his words. Almost. "What do you want from me?"

Potter just studied him for a moment, unflinching and shockingly unconcerned that he was standing before a ravenous vampire who had once nearly killed him. Had only a few hours ago imposed himself upon him. Who only had a taste for his blood.

At last, Potter broke the silence with, "It doesn't seem fair that you have to suffer this alone."

Malfoy flinched at the pity in his voice. "I don't want your bloody pity, _Potter,_" he snapped. "And I don't recommend you offer. Particularly as the only way you can help is by opening a vein and letting me reap the rewards." He lowered his head then, turning his eyes to the fire once more. The way Potter returned his glare so unwaveringly only made the hunger worse. Only made him want to conquer him more.

"You researched vampires," Potter said then. It was a statement, not a question.

"Since you took such pleasure in bringing to attention how ignorant I was," Draco hissed, not looking at him. "And don't waste your compassion. Even if I'd drained you dry back at the start, do you honestly believe that a pureblood raised like I was, by a family like mine could ever feel anything but _revolted _by the disease that courses through me?" His voice was low and sharp with loathing. Hate. He hated everything. The only reason he was still here and hadn't staked himself like a coward was because he was too afraid to be left unremembered. To leave this world as a nothing. A nobody. His fingers clenched so hard his knuckles cracked. No, that was unthinkable…

"I got a kick out of taking you down a notch because even as a vampire you're an arrogant arse," Potter retorted stiffly. "I owe you a life debt for not 'draining me dry' so I was offering an ear since you're limited in choice, but if you want to bite my head off–"

"_Bite you,_" Draco hissed, leaping to his feet, his body arching as he surged towards Potter. "Bite you is exactly what every fibre of my being is screaming at me to do, because all other blood turns to ash in my mouth. And I am restraining myself, Potter, _barely._" Air that did not bring him life left his flared nostrils as he snarled at his prey.

Harry glared at him as the vampire's breath touched his cheeks. It was cool, unnaturally so, like a sudden, light breeze. His throat was on fire now and without thinking, Harry raised a hand to touch it, only to have his wrist seized. He hissed as Malfoy's grasp squeezed him so hard he swore he heard the bones _grind _in negation. Green eyes set with hatred and he stared fixedly into Malfoy's face, not giving him the satisfaction of a wince.

"Same old Potter," Draco growled. "I thought you'd changed, thought you'd grown but you're still the same pigheaded Gryffindor. You think you know everything, but you know _nothing._"

Harry sneered at him raising his chin a fraction in defiance, unwittingly giving Malfoy a tempting view of his throat. "Is there a point to this rant?" He asked offhandedly.

Malfoy smirked darkly, tugging Potter's hand a little higher so that his breath weaved between the boy's fingers. He saw the digits twitch, felt Potter's shiver. He felt it to his bones. The heat coming from that skin swept through his veins like a tide of pure, unbridled pleasure. He let out a little groan, his fangs itching his gums where they lay hidden. The vampire wanted Potter, _so badly. _It had waited for too long…

"If you knew as much as you first thought, Potter, you'd realise that scratching at that bite will only irritate it more. You'd realise, that the fact that its burning increases in my presence is no coincidence…"

There. Potter's eyes flared with confusion and a hint of fear. Delicious. He certainly felt like himself now he'd wiped that smug defiance from the boy's face.

"If its something you've infected me with, Malfoy, you'd best let me know now," Potter warned.

Malfoy lifted his own head back then with pride. It was amazing really, how Harry _bloody _Potter, his first meal, seemed to allow him the chance for some of his human self to seize back control. With his infuriating attitude and heroics, no less.

"You were my first meal, Potter. And I have learnt now that in letting you live, I doomed myself to a life of addiction to your blood."

Those green eyes went impossibly wide then. That tongue darted out to wet those dry lips, tempting him. "Y-You…you're–"

"Addicted. In not finishing you off, I inadvertently invoked a bond in which you are my soul source of food," Malfoy explained mechanically, despite the way his mind was still reeling from the information he had discovered. "It happened in old times, apparently a vampires first meal would often be a lover or close companion, someone they wanted to keep with them. A first meal must be drained until dead. But by taking only a taster the first time, I led our bodies into believing I wanted only your blood and that you wanted to be my only donor."

For a long time, the only sound was the crackling fire, almost vicious in the silence. For a long time, Potter only stared at him.

"You've got to be bloody joking," Harry spat suddenly, shattering the silence and shoving Malfoy away from him roughly, wrenching his hand free in the process. "If think you suckling at my neck like a starving sex-addict was the highlight of my life you're barking, Malfoy!"

Malfoy laughed humourlessly. "Oh, believe me, I can _make _you want it, should I desire it. But you should know this, in sparing your life, I damned myself to a life of thirst. Anything I drink has all the sustenance of ash to me. Eventually, I will starve and turn to ash myself."

Potter looked thoughtful for a moment. And then, "If I don't offer my blood to you on a regular basis you will die?"

"To put it bluntly, eventually yes, I will die. I survived this summer on some blood substitute experiments, but each lasted me not more than a day and now nothing is working at all. I am _dying, _Potter," Malfoy explained flippantly, dropping back into his chair beside the fire, longing for his skin to take in some of its warmth. But the only heat his dead body wanted to devour was the heat of Potter's body.

_Shut it! _He hissed at the vampire growling beneath his skin, gnashing its fangs in hunger for Potter's blood. He was beating it back. He wouldn't lose himself to it.

"I said I wouldn't be a pity fuck for you, Malfoy, what makes you think I'd be your meals on wheels?" Potter snapped. His hands curling into fists at his sides. "My entire bloody life I've been the martyr, I've been expected to give and give of myself and I _have_. I've given until I've ended up this hollow, empty, self-pitying shell. I don't even have a life now. I have _nothing _to give to anyone, not my friends, not the people who want to make themselves my family. Least of all you. I won't be a martyr anymore." Potter was screaming. He was panting for breath, his face flushed with fury and his teeth grinded together loud enough to make Draco cringe.

"I spent seventeen years being a willing sacrifice," Potter said, deathly quiet. "No more." He turned then, whirling on his heel and storming towards the stairs.

Draco leapt to his feet. "You would let me die then?" he demanded.

Potter paused on the first step, but did not turn. "What would you do, if the situations were reversed? I hardly think my life would be your first priority–"

"But you're the bloody chosen one!" Draco insisted.

"Not anymore. I don't know who I am anymore," Harry snarled, bolting up the stairs. He needed to get away, far away from this conversation, this situation and the feelings it incited in his roiling gut. His magic was hard to harness and his control over it hadn't been challenged at all over the summer, now he was finding it even harder to reign in. He shook his head to clear it as he ascended the stairs. He had to keep it under control or it would rule him and he wasn't a weapon any longer. He wouldn't allow his whole life to be dictated by another person or thing, not ever again.

He didn't know who he was, but it was for him to decide, not anyone else.

Harry didn't see Malfoy in the great hall for breakfast, but that was fine with him. As he understood it from the books he'd read, vampires didn't need to eat per se in any case. They just could. Human blood was what kept them going, kept their heart beating and in doing so, kept their organs working similar to a humans. Better in fact. But how was Malfoy functioning if all blood consumed turned to ash in his mouth?

The answer came as he made his way into the Charms classroom. He took his seat on the other side of Hermione of course, even if she and Ron were too engrossed in each other to notice his wandering gaze. It suited him fine that they were otherwise occupied right now, he didn't want to answer questions. Malfoy sat on his own at a desk near the front of the class, so Harry had an unhindered view to his suffering.

His body was tense, his skin so deathly white it looked almost _blue, _his face long and gaunt. He looked like death, in short. It was quite obvious that he _wasn't _dealing with it, wasn't coping with the lack of blood. It had accelerated over night it seemed. It looked as if it were killing him slowly…

_I'm killing him slowly, _Harry thought. _Because I refused to help him out of a sense of pride–_

_He'd do the same to you, and more so, _enjoy _watching you wither away, _his thoughts argued, so loudly that he didn't even realise Flitwick was talking.

"Did you hear me, Potter?" Flitwick demanded.

Harry snapped back into reality with a jerk, sitting up a little straighter as his gaze moved from Malfoy to his professor. "Sir?"

A low huff of impatience left the tiny professor's lips. "First lesson of term and you're already drifting, Potter. Let us hope your attention span improves." With that he flicked his wand, levitating Harry's books and quill up into the air. Harry watched in confusion as they floated across the room…

No.

"You will need to be in pairs for this term, Mr Potter, I urge you to move to Mr Malfoy's side so that you can begin the work. You're all a year behind as it is."

Harry just stared dumbly between him and Malfoy for a moment. It seemed like forever before he could force his legs to move. He felt the eyes on his head, he heard the whispers, especially Hermione and Ron's urgent ones. They were all confused or amused, perhaps a bit of both at the fact that both Harry and Malfoy had been the two 'spares' left after they'd silently chosen their pairs.

_We're both outcasts, _Harry thought wretchedly, throwing his book-bag under the desk and slumping into his seat beside Malfoy. Angling the chair as far from Malfoy as possible within the boundaries of the desk, Harry resentfully drew his wand waiting for the book to finish turning itself to the appropriate page.

"Don't look too pleased with this situation, Malfoy, it doesn't get you any sort of intimacy with me," Harry hissed under his breath. Malfoy turned his head an inhuman fraction to set him with a glare. Harry's own eyes widened a the sight. Malfoy's eyes were almost black, a startling change in his already death-like complexion. Harry swore he could see the veins through that flesh.

"Twice I have extended my hand to you, Potter," Malfoy growled quietly. "Once in friendship, once in search of help. The second time, I assumed you could look beyond past differences in order to save my life, however miserable and pitiable it may be. I wont make that mistake again. And since you so tritely refused to aid me, I have no further use for you."

Harry opened his mouth to answer, but Flitwick was speaking again. "Next lesson will be a practical, this lesson, however, we need to cover the theory of dual casting. Can anyone tell me what that is?"

Oddly, a few hands shot up, of course, Hermione's was the fastest.

"Miss Granger?" Flitwick asked.

Hermione, looking extremely pleased with herself as usual, fastidiously recited, "Dual Casting is the act of performing a spell with a partner in order to increase the strength, speed or sheer force of the spell."

"Correct!" Flitwick squealed, looking as if he wanted to give ten points to Gryffindor and had only _just _remembered in time that eighth year were not included in the house cup.

"This lesson, you will together read through the chapters on joint casting. It isn't as easy as it sounds to cast on the same object, it can have disastrous affects if you aren't in tune with your partner. Your homework for next lesson will be to practice casting separate spells on separate objects but with the same strength and speed."

Harry balked at that, at spending his after school hours trying to _tune _his spell casting to match Malfoy's while all he really wanted to do was keep out of his way. He didn't like the anger, the guilt and the confusion the vampire made him feel. Or the way his throat still felt inflamed. It felt like the bite worsened the more he denied Malfoy his pound of flesh!

It didn't seem fair that he seemed to be forever forced to act as others pleased, not himself. He didn't think he'd ever have his own life. _I will, _he thought defiantly as he kept his eyes on his own book, not giving Malfoy so much as a second look. _This is my time to live for myself, not for anyone else._

That voice may have sounded more convincing if he couldn't feel Malfoy shivering beside him, hear his teeth grinding together and sense the sharp, painful spasms of agony the vampire was trying to smother.

Half hour had passed before Harry swore he heard the blond choking on his efforts to stay upright in his seat. His tongue swiped over his own dry lips nervously as he turned to him. "Malfoy, are you alright?" He whispered. "Maybe you should have a glass of water? Do you need to go to Madam Pomfrey?"

"I need _nothing _from you, Potter!" Malfoy snarled venomously, despite the way his teeth clenched together in pain.

Harry flinched at the biting whisper, but did not miss the moisture gathering on Malfoy's startlingly pale skin. Harry's throat was throbbing painfully now, his own fingers curling into white-knuckled fists under the table.

Suddenly, Malfoy leapt to his feet, all eyes snapping to him. "Professor, I think… may I be excused?" It seemed that before now, the only person to notice Malfoy's sickly appearance was Harry. No one seeing him not could deny he wasn't well, especially since Harry was the only one present who knew he was, in fact, dead.

Flitwick blanched as he surveyed his student, giving him a short nod. Malfoy did not even wait to try and obtain a pass before flying out of the classroom, leaving all his possessions behind in his haste.

Malfoy did not return. When Flitwick dismissed them, Harry packed his own things away. Getting to his feet, he stared at Malfoy's belongings for a moment as the class piled out of the room. He glanced to the door, where Hermione and (oddly) Ron were waiting for him. He made a move to go to them, but something stopped him, something completely separate to the unsettling, throbbing in his scarred throat. It didn't seem right that Malfoy hadn't returned, hadn't taken his things with him.

Hastily, as if afraid of being caught doing it, Harry scooped Malfoy's possessions into the bag abandoned by his empty chair and slung the other bag over his shoulder as well. Both of his friends gave him an odd look as he made his way over to them.

"Harry?" Hermione began, a frown of confusion creasing her brow as they walked together to Potions. "Why are you carrying Malfoy's things?"

Harry stiffened, but managed a shrug all the same, trying to sound complacent about it all. "He left them behind. I won't have him laying all the work on me for Charms and using feeling queasy as an excuse," he said nonchalantly.

"What was wrong with him anyway?" Ron asked, his tone cautious, as if unsure if Harry would be willing to forgive him for his stupidity so soon.

Harry decided to give him no clue either way, not feeling especially generous with Ron's selfish streak right now. "Don't know what was wrong with him. Probably too much reading for his dainty little eyes," he retorted, a chill running through his bones, making the hair on his arms stand on end as they made their way into the dungeons. It reminded him too much of _that place_. The place they had dragged him to, the place where he had watched Malfoy be tortured and then turned into a vampire. The place where he killed Voldemort.

_The spell killed Voldemort, _his mind insisted, _the spell, not me. _

The few times anyone had dared to mention Voldemort's demise, he had exploded into a fit of rage and nearly taken half of Siddlebury cottage with him. He did not kill anyone, he had not and _would _not take a life. That was the beauty of the spell he had used. The spell, the manifestation of it had ended Voldemort, not him. It wasn't as if he took a knife to the monster's throat and slit it open.

_But that is what you're doing to Malfoy, _a voice whispered darkly at the back of his mind, behind the mask of cool indifference he had forced up. _I will be no one's puppet again! _He spat back as they entered the hauntingly familiar potions classroom.

Still, his mind wasn't on the task at hand, but rather the extra book-bag cluttering up the underside of his desk. Three times Hermione saved his potion from ruin by jabbing him sharply in the ribs. "Harry!" She hissed urgently, her eyes trained on the vulture that was Professor Snape as he loomed over Zabini's potion. "That's not hellebore!"

Harry looked down just in time to stop himself from dropping powdered wormwood into the concoction as opposed to the hellebore. He cursed, cursed himself and cursed Malfoy for distracting him without even being present. He could no longer dock house points but Harry was sure Snape would find some way of punishing him for his lack of attention.

Oddly enough, when Snape finally came to Harry's desk, he merely gave the potion a fleetingly unimpressed look before meeting Harry's eyes. "I should be amazed, I suppose, that you managed to get it to this level with the appalling amount of attention you _spared _your work, Potter," Snape sneered. Harry swore that dark gaze snapped to the inflamed mark on his throat before adding, "Passable, but keep yourself focussed in my class or you will find yourself out of it. Am I clear, Potter?"

Harry nodded dully, it was better than what he had anticipated coming out of the potions master's mouth. Was Snape behaving better towards him because he…helped to kill Voldemort? Because he knew now what he had endured? No, ridiculous, Snape was not capable of that. And in any case, his slight change in attitude seemed to apply to the whole class. He was not nice, not by any means, but he was correcting, advising instead of just insulting and banishing the failed or less than perfect brews. He even gave Hermione a small, "Well done, a near-perfect potion, Miss Granger," before sweeping away.

Whatever the reason for it, it seemed to lighten the tension in Harry's muscles for the remainder of the lesson, that was, until a shadow fell over him as he hauled both his and Malfoy's bags onto his shoulder as the class was dismissed.

"Mr Potter," came Snape's forebodingly cool voice. "You will stay behind."

Harry glanced up to see his friends' confusion again and Ron's irritation on his behalf which he could not help but smile at. He just gave them a gesture for them to go on ahead to break before approaching the front desk. Snape had already slunk back behind it and was filtering through the vials of potion the students had set on his desk. He was lifting them out of the stand one by one, as if deciphering which was the best. Harry thought he could clearly make out his whitish pink potion, whereas Hermione's was the bright, brilliant red Snape was now examining.

When the sound of the door closing behind the last student reached Harry's ears, he finally got tired of standing there in silence and cleared his throat loudly. Snape did not react immediately, he studied what Harry thought to be Hermione's potion for a moment longer before closing his hand around the vial carefully and looking up at him.

Those eyes were dark as ever but with a shine of thoughtfulness to them that told him Snape was surveying him, calculating something. Finally, he spoke, his cold, softly droning voice breaking the silence.

"Are you aware, Mister Potter, that the potion you and your cohorts made today is in fact a variation of the Wit-Sharpening potion?"

Harry shook his head, but now he thought about it, ground scarab beetle, armadillo bile, sliced ginger root, he definitely remembered them. As if seeing the light dawning on his face, Snape gave a nod. "Yes, the ingredients, combined with the asphodel, salamander blood, syrup of hellebore and powdered moonstone, they make a new potion that students generally have no use for." He paused. "All students, except you, Mister Potter."

Harry's eyes widened and he struggled to calm his breathing, wishing to bring his hand up to his aching neck. It felt like his blood was about to rupture from his skin there. "W-What do you mean? Sir?" He added the last bit hastily.

Snape raised a brow at the politeness, slowly sweeping to his feet with all the fluidity of a shadow in his dark robes.

"The potion you made, Potter, _Temporentia Sensium_, to you, self-control over the senses. Can you not guess what I might require it for? What _you _might require it for?"

Harry thought for a moment, wondering if his guess would reveal too much to a man he wasn't sure knew about Malfoy's…situation. "Is it for Malfoy, sir?"

Snape glanced to the mark at his throat again, before lifting the vial of bright crimson potion and placing it in Potter's hand. "Close, Mister Potter. The potion, however, is for you."

Harry blinked. "Me? But I–"

"Mister Malfoy's body can only _digest _things because the blood he drinks allows his organs to function, Mister Potter," Snape interrupted. "For you to ingest the solution would mean you both, in turn, would be partial to its effects."

Harry glared at him then, dropping both bags to the floor, infuriated. "You are going to _make _me do as he wishes? You're going to _force _me, is that it? Because that is the only way I will allow someone to use me, to make me into their tool again, Snape. I won't allow anymore of my life to be sapped away by other people's selfish demands of me. I've been alive eighteen years now without living at all!"

"Poor Potter, life has been indubitably unfair to you hasn't it?" Snape snarled, his eyes dark with hate. "Look around, _boy, _the whole world is suffering. There are many who are unluckier than even you, the boy who was robbed of his childhood to face a monster no adult dared to face. Does it not occur to you that while you have lost your family and youth, you still have a great deal?!" Snape raged, surging forwards and seizing Harry's shoulders, physically shaking him.

Harry sneered up at him, magic burning through his skin and filling the air with an electrical sizzling. He grinded his teeth together in an attempt to keep his magic from swelling out of control with the surging fury. "What do I have that's so bloody perfect then, Snape?!"

"You have your friends. You have your magic. You have your health and a man and woman, Lupin and his wife who are so desperate to take you as their son that their attempts to comfort your egotistical self are pathetic to watch!"

Harry gave a cry of pain and rage, throwing Snape off of him and keeping his eyes locked on his hateful face even as his lungs threatened to burst. He was panting with the effort to control himself.

"How dare you?!" Harry hissed. "_How dare you_?! You think I have it all, right? Friends who don't give me the time of day, a family who only want me out of pity? You think that's a good life?!"

"It is more than many have, it is more than I have, you selfish little prat," Snape said, his voice warningly low. "This may not be the life you wanted but it is the life you have. You must learn to make the best of it no matter how awful it is. Lying there complaining how unfair it all is and how wronged you are will not change a thing!"

"You're all the selfish ones! I saved all your lives! I gave up everything, even my _life _to save you all and all you're doing is asking for more, more, _more_! I haven't anymore to give!"

_SLAM!_

Snape's hands slammed down hard on the surface of the desk, causing Harry to jerk back in surprise.

"A child. After all this, you are still a child, no matter what adult responsibilities and agonies you have endured," Snape murmured darkly, his face tight in what Harry thought was desperation. Snape was desperate? For Harry to help Malfoy? "Your mother always gave of herself. She gave and gave until she had nothing left. I had once thought you were becoming less like James Potter and more like her, a good person–"

"Oh, don't you bloody preach to me about being a good person, I may just piss myself with the irony of I all!" Harry snapped, noticing Snape's expression twist with distaste at his words.

"I cannot force you to save him, but I had thought a man who _'gave up everything' _to save us from the Dark Lord would need more reason than unfairness and self-loathing to let someone die."

Harry's mouth snapped shut at that and silence swept over the room. The coolness of the dungeon contrasted sharply with the flush of fury in Harry's skin and he winced as a shiver ran through him. Magic was pulsing frantically through his body, crackling and biting at his veins as he fought to stifle it. It was brewing, it wanted a release but he would not allow it to overcome him. No matter how angry and lost he was. It was Voldemort's power, not his and he wouldn't let it ruin him. His throat was searing hot now and he swore a sound akin to a slow, almost dying heartbeat was thudding dully in his ears.

Slowly, surely, he conquered the swelling magic in his veins back to a dull murmur during the silence that had fallen. Tamed back the savage beast, for now.

"Come with me, Potter," Snape said suddenly, his voice a barely there whisper, but it was more of a question than a statement. He paused where he stood for a moment, before turning and heading to the door. Harry sighed, lugging both bags up onto his shoulder again before following Snape out into the hall. They followed the dark, dungeon corridor down to Snape's office, a sense of dread filling Harry's stomach. Every time he had been here, it had never been for something good.

The office door closed and locked behind them as they entered but Snape was still walking, so Harry followed, finding himself being led to yet another door. The bite mark was throbbing violently now. He let out a half-whimper, half-gasp of pain as he cupped his neck with one hand, pressing down hard to try and alleviate some of the piercing sting.

"Through here," Snape said, pushing the door open and standing back to let Harry go in first.

Harry hesitated. The room was dark from what he could see, illuminated only with the soft, orange glow from the fireplace. He could see thick, dark green drapes hanging shut over some (no doubt enchanted) windows. Lush, worn but comfortable looking furniture and a dark green carpet were shadowed with the silhouette of the dancing flames. This was Snape's _lounge _laying before him. There must be some mistake. He shivered, wondering why the greasy old potions master was leading him to his darkened rooms.

Glancing up to his professor, Harry saw only a nod of assent, before Snape shoved him forward. He stumbled into the room, heard Snape follow him in a bit more gracefully and then the quiet sound of the door shutting behind them.

Harry froze at what he saw there in the chair closest to the fire. Malfoy was always closest to the fire, to the warmth recently. No doubt unnerved by the fact that his body could not keep itself warm, even though he didn't technically feel the cold, Harry thought as he took a few hesitant steps closer. The firelight bathed the deathly pale blond lying in the chair, bound it seemed by thin, glistening ropes, as silver as unicorn's blood.

Malfoy was writhing in his bonds, hissing and spluttering and groaning like a poltergeist being exorcised. It was heart-wrenching to watch, almost painful. Malfoy, who had always been so proud, now brought down to the level of a mindless, snarling beast. Harry felt bile rise up in his throat as he approached, kneeling down in front of where Malfoy sat. He felt tears prick the back of his eyes and he blinked hard, refusing to let them fall. Malfoy was clearly suffering so badly he couldn't even form words. His body surged and arched grotesquely the nearer Harry got. Harry glanced up as Snape neared, the man's dark gaze fixed on Draco's completely.

"It's my blood," Harry said simply, "He needs it so badly he's dying painfully, slowly without it."

Snape just nodded.

Harry worried his lip between his teeth, torn, confused as to what to do. A low screech ripped from Malfoy's lips, slicing through Harry's ears. The sounds leaving him, they sounded worse than death. "I don't care about him," Harry said resolutely, determined a conscience would not betray him. "I don't even like him!"

Silence. And then…

"If that were so, why did you take the trouble to carry Mister Malfoy's bag with you since he disappeared from Charms?" Snape asked.

Harry looked back to Malfoy again, the veins frighteningly prominent, almost black against his ashen skin. His mouth was open, panting like a beast under torture and Harry could bear it no longer. He rolled up onto his knees, his body shaking with anticipation and no little fear. "What do I do?" he asked cautiously.

"Drink the _Temporentia Sensium_," Snape explained. "It will not rob you of sensation or create a lie of your feelings. It will merely allow you to keep hold of your senses, even in the onslaught of intense emotion. He is near-starvation. If I were to unbind him and set him loose he would do us all a harm, including himself. I will have to restrain him while he feeds this time."

Harry gave a small infraction of a nod, opening his hand to reveal the vial of crimson fluid. There was no pause, no second thought now he had seen Malfoy's suffering and he tore the seal off the vial, pouring the potion down his throat. A long, deep inhale of air, then another and another and he felt ready. His heart was thudding madly in his chest, he had to concentrate to stop his breaths from coming out in short, sharp pants but none of it stopped him. The fear didn't even make his bones shake as he shrugged off his school robe and threw his tie over to the side to join it.

"What are you doing Mister Potter?!" Snape gasped, evidently horrified at his strip-show.

Harry flushed but shrugged, his face perfectly straight while his fingers worked the buttons of his shirt. "I don't want to get blood on my uniform, Sir," he explained matter-of-factly. "Seems to me as if Malfoy isn't going to be caring about a bit of mess."

Snape still seemed uncomfortable with that, but he relented in light of what must be done, and soon, before Malfoy's body ate itself alive in starvation.

"Shouldn't I feel different?" Harry asked. "I mean the potion, it… I don't feel any different."

"You won't do, until you are put under pressure," Snape explained, stepping behind the chair that housed Malfoy then. He cast some sort of protection charm on his arms and hands and then seized the thrashing vampire's shoulders. Malfoy howled in pain, in hunger and Harry winced, kneeling up between Malfoy's frantic legs. He flushed darker. It felt so personal, so intimate, and if he was sure of anything he was _certain _that he did not want anything personal or intimate going on with either Snape or Malfoy.

"S-Sir," Harry forced out, shaking slightly with his throbbing jugular inches from a ravenous vampire's fangs. Yes, he could see them now, ice-white, long and sharper than any basilisk fang. "I…I assume that the potion will allow us both to stop when…when it's enough?"

Snape gave another nod. "When you feel your consciousness slipping, tell Mister Malfoy to stop."

Harry's eyes widened. That was the plan? "But, sir, what if he–?"

But it was too late. The silvery bonds holding Malfoy to the chair vanished and the vampire lunged for him. Harry flinched but it seemed Snape caught him just in time, holding Malfoy back from outright ripping Harry's throat out. Malfoy was panting still, his breath ragged and animalistic, dusting over Harry's skin.

Swallowing deeply, Harry closed his eyes, readying himself for what was to come. He turned his head a little, exposing the long, honey-hued expanse of throat, marred only by the inflamed scar created by Malfoy's own fangs. Snape allowed Malfoy a little closer, close enough so that his nose _just _touched Harry's neck.

Harry fought hard not to shudder. He breathed as slowly as he could, but he knew that both he and Malfoy could hear his heart thundering in his chest. "Y-You…you can have it…_me_," Harry said huskily, not daring to open his eyes, not sure he could keep this sense of calm if he saw those fangs. But then he realised.

Syrup of hellebore and powdered moonstone, the ingredients for the Draught of Peace. _Snape would be so proud_, he thought bitterly, on finally comprehending the need for those last two ingredients. If he was relaxed the bite wouldn't hurt, the other ingredients would keep his mind awake during that relaxation, awake enough to not let Malfoy drink too much in his moment of passion and kill him.

"You can have me," he whispered again, trying to calm the savage beast so that when those fangs finally sank into him, he didn't tear his throat out. "But you can't hurt me, or you won't be able to have anymore."

A low croon left Malfoy's lips at that and Harry could not help but shudder from shameful arousal as Malfoy inched forward enough to run the flat of his tongue over the bite mark. Vampire's saliva did the rest. It was good that the vampire in Malfoy seemed to understand what Harry had said, somehow, because suddenly, Harry didn't care.

He didn't care that Malfoy was the one lapping at his throat as if he were an ice-cream, or that Snape was still holding onto Malfoy's shoulders lest the vampire lose control. He didn't care that there were fangs accompanying those wet kisses. He just wanted more.

A groan of need left his lips and he tossed his head back, his hands flying up, welcoming Malfoy to his throat. That tongue pointed, pressed purposefully on the erogenous pinpricks left by his teeth last time. "Yes!" Harry gasped, his hips arching forwards against Malfoy's urgently. "_Please_! Do it!" He wondered distantly if wizards could use vampire saliva to get high the way muggles might with ecstasy, because he was sure this was better than any man-made substance. His head was spinning, his body was dancing without moving. He needed it, more than he needed air.

"Bite me!" Harry screamed and there was but a harsh, teasing suck on his neck, before those fangs pierced him. His eyes flew open. It was painless, it was perfect, like his throat was _made_ for those fangs to sink into. His body arched. His head tilted back to give Malfoy more access to guzzle greedily at his throat, while his groin undulated against Malfoy's, desperate for touch.

Malfoy's fingers, long and possessive, seized hold of him. One hand gripped his hair tightly, keeping his head firmly to one side. The other wrapped around the small of his back, holding their bodies together forcefully. He felt Malfoy groan around his mouthful, the vibrations rippling through Harry's skin and filling him with heat even though consciously he knew that Malfoy was stealing his warmth.

The vampire's icy skin grew warmer with the stolen blood and Harry dimly registered the sight of Snape still standing behind Malfoy, perhaps unsure if Malfoy would let go now he had his prize. He had been _starving _after all. For some reason Harry himself didn't care. Far from that, he found himself massaging Malfoy's scalp with the pads of his fingers, drawing another soft croon from those lips.

Panting hard now, Harry lay limp in the vampire's embrace, all except for his hips which rocked insistently back into Malfoy's. But it was not enough and he felt his limbs shaking, felt them weaken. A glaze of lust covered his eyes, a light sheen of perspiration caressed his skin like the soft, sensuous pass of Malfoy's tongue whenever a drop of blood spilled from his lips. He was so hard. He could not help the humiliating noises that left his lips, quiet, incoherent sounds that begged for more.

Suddenly, a pinprick of awareness pierced the euphoria. It didn't burst it, only made itself known in the chaos of lust and desire of the bite and he knew that now Draco was taking too much. His fingers that had splayed limply in that halo of blond hair tugged as hard as his shaky limbs could manage. "E-Enough!" He gasped, his voice husky and raw from cries of passion. "S-S-Stop, Malfoy. T-T-Too much!"

With the insistence of his final words, he felt Malfoy's frantic sucking pause, but his mouth and body did not withdraw. No, for a moment he was still, but then, Malfoy's tongue returned, lapping soothingly at the bite-marks until Harry felt their throbbing presence dull into non-existence.

Harry's head was still spinning. When Malfoy's fangs withdrew at last, a choked sound left Harry's lips and his eyes fluttered shut. Another pause, as if Malfoy was consorting with his instinct, the hesitation but a heartbeat long before Harry was drawn tightly to that lukewarm chest, one arm supporting his back while the other brought him to an earth shuddering climax.

_~To Be Continued..._


	3. 3- Repurcussions of Chivalry

Author's Note:

Heylo again all! Thank you again for reading, I hope that you are still enjoying? You had a little taster of the smut that is to come later on at least ;) **I have recently made a Harry/Draco music video/trailer for this story. Please watch if you have 3 minutes to spare: (TAKE OUT THE SPACES) **** ww w. yout ube wat ch?v=6-NY7zEsUU8**  


**An important note: **One of my lovely reviewers made me aware that some of you might be thinking that this story is going to have the threesome pairing of Draco/Harry/Snape. I have no intention of that for this story, it's a Draco/Harry story. Snape was only there because he wasn't sure if the potion Harry took would work on a starving vampire. He was only there to protect Harry but that was a one-off and he didn't really enjoy watching either since Draco is like a son to him in this story lol Just in case soem of you were getting scared or grossed out XD

Please, if any of you could spare the time for a review I would be SO happy. Thank you to everyone who has reviewed or read the first few chapters and is still enjoying!

* * *

.: REPURCUSSIONS OF CHIVALRY :.

* * *

When Harry spiralled back down from his blissfully silent oblivion and the fog of ecstasy had finally drifted away, his first coherent thought was that the front of his trousers were damp and sticky. The room was quiet, silent except for the crackling of the fire. The inferno in his throat had died, his body still felt weak and shaky but at least he was thinking straight now.

But then, finally, he realised, those slightly warmed arms were still holding him. His eyes fluttered and focussed slowly, revealing Malfoy's face dangerously close to his own, watching him intently, studying him almost. There was a line of blood on his lips, so startling against his pale skin. Pale, yes, but so much healthier. The blackish veins had vanished to a pale blue, only barely visible this close, his eyes were a rich, shining grey as they studied him. There was even a soft, pinkish hue to his lips now. _My blood really did save him, _Harry thought, flushing slightly at their close proximity and the feeling of Malfoy's unnecessary breath on his skin.

Then it hit him. The humiliating sounds, they echoed through his ears. His own, shameful cries of passion. He'd _begged _Malfoy to bite him! He'd squirmed in his arms and rutted against his hand like a wanton slut. He'd climaxed in his trousers for Malfoy – in front of Snape!

His entire body bunched to flee, to rage, to scream, but the relaxing feeling brought on by the potion delayed him long enough for Malfoy to anticipate the explosion.

"You've lost a lot of blood, Potter, don't do anything stupid or you'll pass out," Malfoy warned him, before lifting him as easily as if he were made of feathers. He hissed in irritation as Malfoy carried him over to the generously sized settee and laid him on it. "Severus can give you a Blood Replenishing potion but you'll still be weak and light-headed after giving me so much."

"Indeed," Snape said from across the room where he was searching through his personal potions storage. He seemed awkward with what had occured, if not a little repulsed, and trying very hard to distance himself from them. Harry was grateful to that at least, though it would've been much preferable if his professor _hadn't _just seen him come in his knickers. His stomach lurched at that.

"We'll have to arrange a schedule so that Mr Malfoy does not get into such a dire state again. It would be much more preferable to take small amounts regularly rather than large doses when he is on the brink of starvation–"

"Oh, and that's alright with the two of you, is it?!" Harry demanded, bolting upright, regretting the action instantly. His head twisted, his vision spun. He felt dizzy and nauseated and cold all at once. He grit his teeth, snarling through the pain and disorientation. He'd be damned if he humiliated himself anymore this evening. Despite the pain, he raised his head, glaring in Malfoy's general direction.

"Have you already forgotten that I came here of my own free will? I don't _have _to give you my blood. I don't have to give you anything, I can let you starve if I want to, so it might be an idea to treat me with a little respect!"

Malfoy's eyes darkened and he flew towards him, descending over Potter's body and glaring directly into his eyes. "Do you intend to blackmail me then, Potter?" he hissed venomously. "You intend to control me and threaten me with starvation? What makes you any better than the Dark Lord?"

Harry flinched. At the comparison of himself and Voldemort, not Malfoy's harsh voice, not his threatening behaviour. Although their closeness made him more than a little uncomfortable. "I was talking about common courtesy, you prick, not blackmail," Harry corrected tersely, his vision still blurry and nausea still rippling through his gut. "I gave you something of myself. I did you a bloody favour, it isn't much to ask for respect and consideration in return!"

"Quite, Mr Potter," Snape said levelly, suddenly beside them and pressing a vial of potion in Potter's hand. "Two drops now, two drops with breakfast tomorrow morning," he explained, fixing Malfoy with a calculating stare as Harry took the specified dose. "His wording leaves much to be desired but he makes a fair point, Draco. And I believe that looming over him like a shadow is poor repayment indeed. Sit yourself down so we can talk this through like adults."

Harry felt the potion go down, and immediately his dizziness and nausea eased. He still felt light-headed and shaky but at least he could see the other two men clearly now. Snape was standing by the fireplace, his arm propped on the mantle, eyes flickering with the light of the fire as he stared into it contemplatively. Malfoy, however, was sat in the comfy chair nearest Harry watching him unwaveringly.

A heavy silence permeated the room, which smelt of blood and sex now. Harry shifted, uncomfortably sticky and loathing the way it reminded him of his weakness. Reaching for his wand where it lay in the piles of his robes, he cast a quiet, hasty cleaning charm on the damp patch. At least he had some of his dignity back now. He was still infuriated with Malfoy's behaviour, with his _own _behaviour, perhaps it was the _Temporentia Sensium_, but he didn't feel like he needed to explode with anger – not just yet.

"If we're going to do this, I would prefer that I'm not the only coherent one every time," Harry said at last, breaking the silence. "And I don't want to feel like this every time you…_feed_. It feels like I've been trampled by hippogryffs." He paused for them to offer some form of response, but it seemed he'd stunned them both to silence somehow. They were both watching him curiously, as if he had never acted mature and level-headed before.

_Honestly, _he thought reproachfully. _You'd think I wasn't an adult at all…_

"So how regularly does a vampire require blood before he is driven to madness?" Harry asked when they said nothing. This time, Snape answered.

"I have strived to discover all I can regarding Draco's condition," he said. "From what I have gathered, whilst he is still new to…_this, _a minimum dose every three days should be enough so that he doesn't start to feel withdrawals. In time, once a week will be sufficient, but only Draco will know exactly when he is ready for that."

Harry nodded, worrying his lip thoughtfully. He wished he could be angry enough to storm out, strong enough to manage it on his own. He felt utterly humiliated at being intoxicated to the point where he squirmed like a whore in front of them both. Malfoy was bad enough, but Snape as well? He shivered. It was too much to bear. He felt quite sick…

"I'd rather you not be present every time," Harry said abruptly. "I thought the _Temporentia Sensium_ was supposed to help me keep my cool but… I just don't like this. Any of it. I don't like that I have to do this, but I will. I'd just rather there's as few people watching me humiliate myself as possible." His voice was terse, to the point and he watched as Snape raised a brow at his words.

"The potion takes effect only when your body is under great stress or threat. To remove your 'humiliating' reaction to Draco's…saliva would be imprudent. You need it to make the bite pleasant, even bearable for you. All that the potion does is make certain you are not completely lost to the effects of his saliva, it ensures that you can stop the connection when Draco has had too much. And, like now, calm you when you need rest, especially if what you really want is to rant and rage…"

"Listen, I'm fine," Harry snapped. "I'm more pissed off that I'm giving to a person who can't even be gracious about it, than the fact that I have to do this at all." He fixed Malfoy with a glare. "Fine, once every three days, but I'll need an excuse as to where I go on those evenings. Hermione and Ron at the very least will ask questions–"

"I absolutely forbid you to tell them!" Draco shrieked, leaping to his feet. "The Weasel would enjoy my suffering all too much and besides which, this is my curse, my secret, the fewer people who know, the better!"

"Precisely why I asked for an alibi you prat," Harry snorted, "I hardly think the whole world knowing I'm your personal 'meals on wheels' is ideal. Bloody hell, I'd have thought you'd be more mellow after _drinking _your fill, that you'd be in a better mood."

At that, Snape gave a small chuckle of dark amusement. "That may be, Mister Potter, Draco I believe is of foul temperament due to the lack of satisfaction to his much-provoked _sexual _appetite."

Harry's eyes went wide at that. "Oh," he said dumbly. "Is…? Are you…? Do you fancy blokes then, Malfoy?" he asked. It would make sense, if he were that way inclined, having another man arch and writhe and come against your body would indeed have 'that' effect. And Malfoy hadn't climaxed, Harry noted.

Malfoy seethed. "Eloquent as ever," he snapped. "It was friction, Potter. The physical reaction of my body to the touch of another. I have no desire for you, personally. Any red-blooded male would do to sate my needs–"

"But not your appetite," Harry noted. "If you have no desire for me, why polish me off in front of Snape, hmm?"

If Malfoy had the blood to spare, Harry swore the vampire would have flushed. "If you think I did it because I _wanted _to, Potter you have another thing coming," he snarled, folding his arms tightly over his chest. "The vampire wants you, in every conceivable way. It thinks you belong to it, its first and only. But don't you confuse my desires with a vampire's instincts. The vampire wanted to sate your urges as you sated its hunger, but all I want is to get as far away from you as possible!"

Across the room, Snape clucked his tongue in frustration. Clearly he was not in the least bit amused by the hormonal rollercoaster of two teenage boy-men. "Pride and denial are a lethal mix," Snape murmured, taking up the other cosy chair near the fire and watching them both critically.

Harry frowned at the statement, not entirely sure he understood it. Then he looked back to Malfoy once more. "That makes no sense," he said. "Surely the vampire and you are one being? Didn't the summer give you time enough to adjust to that?"

Suddenly, Malfoy's gaze was glowing with a deadly venom. His fingernails hooked in the fabric of the chair, as if it was by sheer will alone he did not leap from the chair and tear out his throat. "A lifetime would not be long enough to adjust to the constant hunger pains, the knowledge that I will _never, ever _be human again. I am tainted, _imperfect_–"

Harry's jaw set with irritation. Malfoy had changed alright, but some things were obviously buried far too deep. "Tainted by blood, the same way that my father's pure blood is tainted by my mother's muggle blood?" He leapt to his feet. "Are you sure you want to drink from something so disgusting? Is that _all _that matters to people like you?" he demanded. "Blood, lineage? I would have thought that _you _of all people should know by now that that is not what determines who you are!"

Snape's eyes were dark and contemplative, as if deciphering that statement, Malfoy, to Harry's delight, looked more than a little confused.

"Why, whenever we have a conversation do you make everything about yourself?" Malfoy retorted sharply. "The world doesn't revolve around you–"

"I was merely saying that your blood doesn't make you who you are!" Harry shouted. And then, "And from what I gather, from now on, your world does revolve around me. Me, your next feed."

Malfoy grit his teeth, barely caging the snarl of fury behind them. "Playing with fire, Potter."

Harry raised a brow. "I'm not afraid of you, Malfoy. I've faced bigger, scarier things than you. So don't even _try _intimidation." He waited for a moment, to see if Malfoy would silence at last and when he did, he tried again. "Listen, I've agreed to do this–"

"Oh, don't make it sound like you're doing me such a big favour, Potter, considering you just burst in your pants like a twelve-year-old–"

"I was drugged with your weird vampire drool!"

"Which removes your inhibitions, relaxes your body, it does not _create _the reaction, you fool!"

"Look, just…shut it, alright?" Harry snapped. "We're never going to come to any kind of arrangement if we keep arguing. And I, for one, want to go and lie down before my brain starts to dribble out of my ears!"

"Or what's left of it," Snape murmured quietly in his corner. Harry decided to ignore that. How was it _he _was taking the level or maturity when he was the one at the least advantage here?

"Every three days, maybe after dinner so I can just go to sleep afterwards and not have to worry about classes?" Harry suggested, thinking perhaps it might be better for his stomach to be full, also. Malfoy didn't say anything at all, but the fact that he wasn't arguing or disagreeing was helpful. He seemed to be amenable to the suggestion.

"I concur," Snape said then, "And I will arrange for it to be common knowledge that you are both in need of extra lessons given your…_significant involvement _in the war. I will also see if I can make it look as though Professor McGonagall has arranged it."

"Y-Yeah," Harry nodded slowly, it still seemed so surreal, yet the dizziness in his head and the shakiness of his limbs was a constant reminder of the situations genuineness. "Right, fine. And this stays between us." He used the arm of the settee as a support as he began to move around it, his legs wobbling like jelly. "I suppose I have classes to get to now…"

"Mr Malfoy will escort you to the dormitory and ensure you reach your bed, of course," Snape replied shortly. "I will send a note to your teachers to explain your absence in some…_other _way. You are to rest after losing so much blood."

Harry opened his mouth to argue but said nothing in the end. Hastily he pulled on his shirt and robe, picking up his bag and making his unsteady way through the door without waiting for Malfoy, without so much as a single glance back. Of course, Malfoy caught up with him. Even if he wasn't a vampire, Harry was too shaky to get far.

"Get off me, Malfoy," Harry snapped as Malfoy tried to take his arm. He really wished the potion would wear off so he could just explode and charge at Malfoy liked he really wanted to. In all due time, he supposed. The blond snorted then, before making do with taking Harry's bag for him instead. At that odd act of courtesy, Harry stopped staring at him, his mouth agape. "Just what are you playing at?"

Malfoy scoffed at his words, slinging their bags over his shoulder, walking a few steps before tipping his head back in a show of indifference, his blond locks damp with sweat and framing his slightly pointed face. "Perhaps I am listening to what you said about repaying courtesy," the blond snapped hatefully, walking on purposefully slow.

Harry scowled, but limped dazedly after him, leaning heavily on the wall. "Bullshit, you just think you have more chance of having your way if you manipulate me with fake kindness!"

At that, Malfoy growled, resisting the urge to turn and throttle his first. "Make up your mind. What is it that you want, Potter? You're giving me a bloody migraine!" To that, oddly, Harry remained silent and the slow, _torturous _trudge to the Eighth year common room was made in silence.

Thankfully, because of classes still going on, the common room and the entire way leading to it was devoid of life. The common room was dead, the fire gone, the room as cold as Harry felt. He was shivering, shaking all over. He needed to rest. His body was aching. Trembling from head-to-toe, he only just managed to reach the stairs before his legs gave out. His arms flew out, scrambling for purchase on the banister to steady himself, but to his disgust, it was Malfoy's grip on his arm that had kept him upright.

"Do stop trying to be a blood hero," Draco hissed, not giving Potter the chance to argue, dragging him up the stairs and tossing him onto his bed as soon as he'd elbowed open the door to boys' dormitory. The most amusing snarl left Potter's lips and Draco raised a brow at the impressive fury, dropping the _Chosen One's _bag by the side of his bed. He lingered there only to humour the man who seemed to be close to explosion despite the calming nature of the potion. His face was flushed with anger and Draco swore the tendons in his throat were about to snap.

"Don't toss me around like I'm your property you arrogant arse," Potter snapped, righting himself on the bed, his fingers digging into the sheets.

"I may be arrogant but I can accept help when I need it you pillock, you'd run yourself into the ground if you were left to your own devices!"

"I'm touched that you care," Potter sneered sarcastically, "I was left to my devices most of my life and did just fine."

Draco shook his head in dismay, turning towards his own bed directly across from Potter's and beginning to change clothes. Blood and sweat could be spelled away but his sensitive senses could still pick up the scent of Potter's life's blood on his shirt and he needed to be able to keep his head clear if he was to deal with Potter's foul temper. He rooted through his trunk, tugging out a fresh shirt and shedding his old one.

The room fell oddly silent then and Draco turned as he pulled his fresh shirt on, just in time to catch Potter's eyes on him. Of course, those green eyes darted away immediately and Potter shifted back on his bed, taking off his glasses and setting them on the side table. _No doubt to resist temptation, _Draco thought, his cock still hard and hungry in his trousers, not listening to Draco's good sense and far too aware of the vampire's desires.

Draco chuckled quietly at Potter's determination to avoid his eyes and crossed the room, tying his tie as he went towards the door. "Don't do anything heroic like get out of that bed, Potter, you need to recover before the swarm of irritatingly nosy ex-gryffindors arrive after lessons."

"Sod off, Malfoy," Harry sniped, rolling onto his side and closing his eyes, feeling every muscle in his body still tense and quiver slightly. His body felt unsettled, unwilling to relax still ,even though he was exhausted and the potion was still in his system. Pulling the covers up under his chin, he tried to drift, tried to fall away but could not. He could still feel the bastard's greedy eyes on him. _Like he hasn't had his fill already, _his mind spat.

Suddenly, he felt a pressure on the bed then and he went rigid under the sheets. He _felt _Malfoy's shadow over him and he swallowed nervously. "Get off my bed," he demanded through clenched teeth. But Malfoy didn't move, he remained on the side of the bed, leaning over him it felt like. Harry winced. He'd never really enjoyed closeness in the way that other human beings did but he never shied away from touch. And ever since the events in the dungeon that day with Voldemort, he had found it was almost unbearable, but…

_But not when you drank that potion and came under Malfoy's touch like a panting bitch, _a very Malfoy-ish voice sneered in his head.

A snarl of anguish left him then and he flipped over, his arm tearing the covers from his body and making to swipe at Malfoy where he loomed above like a storm-cloud threatening rain. Harry yelped when Malfoy's hands shot out lightning fast, pinning his hands above his head. It didn't take a genius to know what was causing the dark glow to those unearthly eyes. Not when there was a distinct hardness pressing into him, slightly warmer than the rest of Malfoy's lukewarm body.

_Heated by my blood, _he realised, revolted at the thought that _he _had given Malfoy warmth.

"Get off of me, Malfoy," Harry hissed warningly, his skin humming with restrained magic, "I don't know why you think me agreeing to give you my blood on a _strict _schedule changes anything between us, but let me clear something up. I still don't want your pity fuck or anything else you have to offer me. Is that clear?! Nothing has changed, _nothing_!"

Malfoy gave an inhuman snarl, his grip on Harry's wrists tightening. His nose was almost touching Harry's now, his cold breath making the little hairs on the back of Harry's neck stand on end. "Perhaps you pitying me enough to allow me some of your precious (easily replenished) blood changes nothing, but coming under my touch _does_–"

"One forced the other, you heard Snape, I had no control over it," Harry interrupted. "Listen, I don't know why you're doing it but you're grasping at straws with me–"

"It's called adapting, Potter."

"It's called surrendering to instincts, the very thing you said you didn't want to do!" Harry snapped. "It's called not being able to separate your cock from your brain!"

Fangs broke their cover in Malfoy's gums then, sharp and white and a hairsbreadth from Harry's lips.

"So I'm hard, after that shameful display in the dungeons you're hardly one to talk." Draco punctuated his words by grinding his hips into Harry's leg, a shallow hiss of pleasure leaving his lips. _Yes, _the vampire groaned in his head, _take him, he's bursting for it. Can't you hear his heart pounding? _

Draco shook his head then, trying to silence that voice. That wasn't who he was. _He _didn't want Potter, he was just convenient, and it was _his _fault that his cock felt like it was about to burst afterall. He could take Potter, and then he would have some power back at least. Potter would probably even _like _it!

_But you shouldn't want it, or him,_ his conscious mind whispered. _He's not your lover or your friend. _

Suddenly, a spark like electricity burst under his hand. He jerked where he pinned Potter. He swore that it had come from Potter's _skin. _

Magic crackled there like a ripple of static and he groaned as it tingled, vibrated through his own dead flesh. _Dead. _He was dead without Potter, he realised, the only time his body felt satisfied, or even _alive _anymore, was when he was with Harry bloody Potter. _That's why I feel like I almost want him, _he realised, throwing himself backwards off of Potter with the sheer force of the insight.

He growled furiously, wanting desperately to kick, to bite, to _tear _into something. But he didn't know his own strength and barely withheld himself, his nails biting bloody gouges into his palms. Would this be his life now? Only alive when suckling at Potter's throat and suffering his foul temper, his bitterness afterwards? He shook his head from side-to-side, a crescendo of confusion swirling like a tsunami in his head. He gave a weak snarl at last, snatching up his satchel and bolting with vampire speed to the door.

"I have a lesson to get to, stay in bed, Potter," he snapped before flying out the door.

What followed was the most amazing discovery. He shot down the stairs, through the castle towards his Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson – and it was like flying, only without a broom. He felt a clarity, a freedom he had only felt at Potter's throat since he'd been changed. Every ounce of fury and confusion was blown from his senses at a hundred miles an hour and he almost laughed at the relief of it all.

None of the supposed 'super powers' vampires possessed had come to him over the summer. Now he realised why, he had not been feeding and so had not developed. But now he had, now he was developing alright. He felt stronger already, he was faster. He did laugh then, seeing the staircase swirling away from the landing he was on. His muscles tensed, his legs hurled him upwards and he was truly flying then, leaping through the air and landing squarely on the moving staircase.

Draco could see every thought in his head as clear as day now. The sharp breeze created by his speed as he continued speeding down the staircase, it felt like a refreshing storm after weeks of suffocating, disorientating heat. And the fire in his groan was an unbearable heat compared to the usual coldness of his skin he still had yet to adjust to.

His passions had built up like his thirst for blood had, unfortunately, Potter wasn't as amiable about sating that hunger. He was barely agreeable to keeping him alive, and Draco could trust no one else to get that close any longer. He stopped at that, nearly scaring the life from a second year who had not noticed him flying through. He _trusted _Potter? That petulant, bad-tempered arse? Draco snorted, continuing up the corridor to his lesson at human speed then, that was a joke. That he would trust someone like that. Why would he?

The answer reached him as he stepped through the doors of the Defence Against the Dark Arts class and took his seat, by himself at a desk.

The fool was so stupidly honest and gallant there was simply no one else anyone could trust their life with. Even if they hated him more than Draco did, which was unlikely. the prat had complained and fought and claimed he wanted his life for his self now, but he had still given him, Draco, his blood. And then, the other, deeper truth - he and Potter were in the same boat, were so similar in pain it was ridiculous. It made perfect sense.

_Bloody hell, _Draco thought, dragging out his text books and setting them on the desk, waiting for the new teacher to arrive. Whoever it was hadn't been at the staff table for the first meals and now, pushing the thoughts of Potter and his own momentarily sated hunger aside, he was curious as to who it would be. This would be the person responsible for his final marks and so, his future, after all. A future he was very determined to make better than it currently looked.

Suddenly the door flew shut and footsteps resounded in the now silent classroom. Draco frowned at the aura sweeping through his senses, unnerving his mind and slowly, he turned his head to see the new defence teacher strolling up the aisle between tables. A frown creased Draco's brow. The man's robes billowed about him, like a cloud of dark smog, his short, dirty blond locks slicked back so that a pair of murky blue eyes pierced Draco's.

Why did he feel unsettled around this man? Who _was _he?

Casually, the teacher strode to the front of the desk, flipping back his sleeve to gesture at the blackboard with his wand. Immediately, the chalk leapt to life scrambling frantically to write whatever the silent spell had ordered. As soon as the chalk dropped uselessly again, the man turned to face the class, who were silent in their awe. Draco studied the letters on the board, something akin to foreboding rising in his chest.

_ Professor Caius Nicodemus Alaric_

The words were like a bad omen in chalk. A shiver ran down Draco's spine then, as he raised his eyes to Alaric. The man was standing before them all now, studying them all with those cold eyes, eyes that rested far too long on Draco for his liking.

"Eighth years," Alaric said at last, shattering the silence with his acerbic voice. It was not the soft droll of Snape's nor the abruptness of McGonagall's. This voice was smooth but as sharp as ice and Draco watched his every move like a hawk. There was just something about him that made him want to draw his wand for protection. He was powerful, there was no doubt about that. And Draco could not shake the feeling that this man might turn on them at the last minute.

It was the curse of the Defence Against the Dark Arts position come back to bite him for a change, it seemed.

"I understand how important this year is to you above everyone else. It is about redeeming what you lost in the travesty of a war, about proving yourselves in spite of it…about…_finding yourselves._" His eyes seemed fixed to Draco then, who finally tore his gaze away and opened his book, browsing the front page distantly. He wished he'd picked a seat farther from the front. He'd picked this one because it had been the only completely empty desk, but it was in the first row.

"I can assure you, I excelled in all of my subjects and am more than academically elevated to ensure your pass in this subject. Times are hard, as we know it. You'll all need everything you can to get by until the wizarding world settles from the chaos it has been hurled into by a mad man…"

It seemed curious to Draco that this man would be anti-Voldemort. For some reason he had him pegged as a death eater. But that obviously wasn't the case. Draco couldn't smell a lie on him, he passionately hated the Dark Lord just as much as he had. But there _was _something about him, something he couldn't out his finger on. This man was more ominous than Severus Snape himself!

"We start this term with a brief course of what you learnt last in your sixth year, particularly that which is relevant to what you will learn this year. After the first few weeks we will have a test on the refreshed knowledge and then begin on your 'seventh' year education." Alaric paused there, studying the entire classroom then. "So few of you in comparison that returned. It is…startling. You have all had your lives robbed from you, I will do what I can to ensure that you can take it back."

There was still silence among the class. No one seemed to know what to make of him, his burning passion and yet his obvious icy soul.

"So," Alaric stated simply, breaking the tension with a lighter voice, lilting slightly as he pulled a roll of parchment towards him on the teacher's desk. "I have your sixth year syllabus here…"

The rest of the lesson went by without a hitch. It was mostly revision but everyone seemed to be rusty, they definitely needed this 'refreshment' and Professor Alaric, he even began to seem more human as he nattered on. He answered questions, awarding Granger with a slither of a smile when she got his own questions correct, even making sure that the quieter students were learning as well.

Draco, however, rebuffed his one attempt at assistance, and could not help but feel that that offer had been for show more than anything. He seemed oddly fixated on him. It reminded Draco of the sickening hunger he'd seen in the Dark Lord's eyes before the brute had had the gall to ask for his presence in his bed. The memory still made Draco's lukewarm blood run cold…

_"You are quite handsome, Draco," the Dark Lord crooned as he rose slowly from his throne-like chair. Only a few of the death eaters remained at the table in the manor now, among them his parents, who sat either side of him, horrified at the approach of their master and his fixation with their only child._

_ "Beautiful, I might even say," Voldemort continued in that low, rasping whisper, a sound that made the hairs on Draco's arms prickle. Sweat broke out across his forehead and he shivered in the cold room, his master's breath echoing as he approached. Then those icy, long, pallid fingers were on him, caressing his cheek. He couldn't help it, he flinched._

_ A low, disturbing chuckle whispered over Voldemort's lips, that foul breath touching his skin. "You're beautiful indeed, and you know it. So conceited, so arrogant, bold as brass and yet deep down you're as innocent and pure as the first few drops of snow." Those fingers turned slightly, the backs of the knuckles running down Draco's temple in a feigned loving caress. "I would very much like to take you to my bed." _

_ There was an unmistakable intake of breath from his mother at his side then, a flinch of his father's hands on the table and a hiss of seething jealousy from Bellatrix. _

_ "My _Lord_!" Bellatrix snarled, "that scrawny little brat? I could–"_

_ "Silence, Bella," Voldemort hissed with all the venom of a cobra, seizing Draco's chin firmly and tilting his face back towards him, his pale lips lifted into a maniacal, perverted smirk. He liked Draco's reluctance. Liked that he knew Draco would have to say yes, pretend he wanted to, even if he didn't. "Who I wish to take as consort is my wish."_

_ Draco closed his eyes, trying to stop the tears from welling, but when he opened them again, he turned his head away, looking imploringly to his father. The man remained frozen, staring at his son longingly, desperate to help but fear rooted him to his seat. A lump rose in Draco's throat and he craned his neck to greet his mother's gaze, his breath catching. That was it._

_ "My Lord!" Narcissa declared in desperation, throwing herself to her knees on the cold stone floor, tugging at her master's robes without an ounce of shame. "Please! My Lord, my son, not my son! He's just a boy, a _child, _my Lord, please. He is as you say, he is pure, he is afraid. He isn't ready. Take me, my Lord, take Bella, anyone but my little–!"_

SMACK!

_ The sound resounded through the room. Draco flinched at the collision of Voldemort's hand slamming into his mother's face. His stomach churned at the sight of her neck snapping to the side, her body thrown back from the blow. Her chest rose and fell frantically but she was otherwise immobilised by the shock of the blow. _

_ "You dare to insult me this way!" Voldemort bellowed, releasing Draco to stare down at his fallen mother. "You beg for mercy as if my taking your son is the worst punishment imaginable? Are you so concerned for his petty virginity that you would be so foolish! I am the Dark Lord! He is my servant, you are _all _my servants! If I desire something you will all strive to give it to me and delight when I receive it, even if it is the head of your newborns! You have crossed me already on matters concerning your son, Narcissa. Be careful not to cross me again."_

_ With that, Voldemort turned back to Draco again, evidently satisfied that he, Draco was now shaking. The blond in question felt his stomach lurch. He was going to be sick, of that he was certain. "Now, Draco. I wish for you to as my consort. Will you deny me?!" His voice was demanding, unwavering and Draco shook so hard he thought he would choke on his saliva. He turned his head to the side once more. Seeing his father still in his chair ended it for him then and he lost himself to despair. _

_ "My Lord," Draco breathed desperately, closing his eyes, unable to face the world that had failed him so spectacularly. "I…I cannot. Please, my Lord. I cannot…cannot do that. I am…" His grit his teeth, shame rippling through his body with his following words. "I don't want…I can't do it."_

He had paid dearly for those words, days of torture at the monster Fenrir Greyback's hand and then ultimately, _this, _infinity bound to Potter's blood if he desired to live at all. He had been afraid, had been too cowardly and now he would pay for it every day for the rest of eternity. Without thinking, he ran his fingers over his face, wondering if the scars still remained, and if so, how many.

"Mr Malfoy."

That cold, icy voice tore him back to reality violently. Draco flinched as he glanced up and found Professor Alaric at his desk, staring down at him with something alarmingly akin to hatred thawing the ice in his eyes. Draco sat up a little straighter, raising his chin defiantly. He was afraid yes, and unnerved, but nothing worse than what he had already suffered could happen to him now. He was already as good as dead with Potter as his only lifeline. He would not betray his fear again. He decided right then, he would not be a coward and shame his mother and father anymore.

"Professor Alaric?" Draco said airily, folding his hands on his desk in front of him casually, waiting for the professor to continue.

Professor Alaric raised a dark brow, surveying him thoughtfully. "It seems we are out of time, class dismissed," Professor Alaric declared softly, and the students moved about gathering their things and leaving the room, Draco however, was rooted to the spot with Alaric's simple command of, "Mr Malfoy, stay behind."

When the classroom had finally cleared, Professor Alaric swept across the room, shutting the door quietly behind the last student. Draco frowned at the foreboding in the fluidness of his movements, and stood from his seat, his limbs tensed, ready to fight back or flee.

"Is there something distracting you from my lessons already, Mr Malfoy?" Professor Alaric asked, approaching Draco slowly.

Draco barely withheld his flinch. It was easier to stay still now he was no longer human, he found. "Things on my mind, Professor," Draco admitted aloofly. "The war had an affect on all of us. I'm…I'm not used to being back at Hogwarts. It seems like it can't really be over – the Dark Lord, the war…"

Professor Alaric tilted his head to the side, laying his hands on the table and leaning over slightly. He was taller, much taller than Draco and he towered over him. But Draco did not so much as bend. He watched Alaric's mouth open then in speech, poised to react to whatever he might attack him with first.

"Dark Lord indeed," Professor Alaric sneered. "Whether your life was heaven or hell under _His _reign is irrelevant to me, Mr Malfoy. My opinion was formed of you by a much more specific event." Those eyes flashed with hatred again, dark and fiery. Draco took a step back but those hands shot forwards, pinning his to the desk top.

"What exactly is it I am supposed to have done to you? I have never heard of you before today!" Draco snapped, trying to yank himself free but failing. It was as if Professor Alaric had heightened his strength with magic somehow without him noticing.

Instead of answering him, however, Alaric's sneer of disdain grew and he leant even closer. He ignored Draco's words and asked instead, something completely random. "Where is Mr Potter today, Mr Malfoy?" he asked.

Draco's eyes widened, but otherwise betrayed no movement. "He came over peculiar in the dungeons and Professor Snape asked me to escort him back to the dormitories. You can ask Professor Snape, you can go check to see if the precious golden boy is still in his bed if you're so concerned!" The pressure on his hands became unbearable then, he swore he felt his bones grinding together under Alaric's grip.

"Mr Potter is not my concern, it is what you did today to him that I am asking about."

Draco winced when Alaric released him to draw his wand. Before he knew it, a flash of light had consumed his vision.

"_Legilimens!" _Alaric cried. Draco was back there again, in the dungeons, pain laced his bones now as it did then, reminding him exactly what Potter had rescued him from. A flash of shifting between memories then, and he saw Potter, saw him strip and step towards him with shaky confidence. _Felt _him groan and arch under his tongue as he lapped frantically at his throat. Felt Potter's cum against his blood-warmed palm…

Suddenly he was thrown back into the present, so roughly that he hurtled across the room and slammed into the desks, knocking them over. His chest was heaving with breath he didn't need, his body was ice-cold and sweating as it had been before Potter fed him. He struggled to right himself in the debris of wood from the desks, his body throbbing with pain, with _desire_. Seeing Potter like that again, reliving his pleasure had made his cock harden in his trousers.

It had also made his fangs sprout from his gums for Professor Alaric to see quite clearly.

"Just as I thought," Professor Alaric snarled, stepping towards him, wand still drawn. "So young and shiny new. Just a hint of blood or arousal from your _First _and your fangs burst like an adolescent in a wet dream." He kicked aside some debris from his path, the splinters landing on Draco who now shot to his feet with vampire speed, his fangs throbbing with want for Potter.

"So if you know I am a vampire perhaps you know it isn't wise to taunt me," Draco snapped, stepping up to the man now. A hand at his throat stifled his misplaced confidence, however, and it left him dangling off the ground, his body singing with want and pain.

"You're a sapling. A runt who knows nothing of the world around him," Professor Alaric retorted coolly. "And you will say nothing of this, of _me _or the entire school, nay the world will discover_what you are._"

Draco's eyes widened. No that would mean the end of him. Surely. He could not endure that.

"What do you bloody well _want _from me?!" Draco snapped, clawing frantically at Professor Alaric's grip on his throat. "You don't care about Potter or the Dark Lord so what in Merlin's name is it you want?!"

A cruel chuckle pierced the air between them then, sliding slickly over Alaric's lips like blood.

_Blood. Yes. Potter's blood! _The vampire in him swooned.

"You have wronged me greatly, Draco Abraxas Malfoy," Alaric purred dangerously. "And I intend to make you suffer for it."

Draco's mouth opened with a response, only to slam shut again with the impact of something hard, unyielding and _searing _hot against his jaw. He staggered back, crying out in anguish and clawing frantically at his face. His eyes flew wide, and he gawped at the sight of his own blood and molten flesh dangling sickeningly off of the knuckle-duster that had suddenly appeared on Alaric's right fist.

The vampire felt the tattered skin knitting back together swiftly, but it did not appease the searing pain he had felt scarce seconds before. He took a few more steps back, trying to keep out of range. Such pain, he never thought he would feel it again after his torture in the dungeons of Malfoy Manor. That had been his one good thought, and then he had faced the unbearable agony of hunger for blood, and now this.

_I am still weak, still pathetic, no amount of superhuman speed or growing strength will ever save me from that._

"Yes," Alaric breathed then, shaking the vile droplets of his flesh off his hand like water. "You can still feel pain as greatly as you did when you were human. But the most perfect thing about making you suffer is that you heal faster, leaving me a stunningly pristine canvas once more."

The demon in professor's skin dragged his scalding weapon down the length of Draco's chest, creating a bloody, smoking trail of molten flesh. Draco screamed so loud he swore he felt something in his throat tear. His hands struggled, swiping at Alaric frantically, squirming, screeching, anything to escape this torment. He had never felt pain of this like before. Not since that werewolf.

He set his jaw, grinding his teeth as he fought against the urge to cry. Could he even cry? He threw his head back as the moments, long, agonising moments _burned _away with each new strip of flesh that grew only to be torn back again. He closed his eyes tight, his entire body tense as if he could _will _the strength to him, summon it to throw this monster off. But he was still weak, he could still not save himself, and Potter certainly wasn't on hand to do it this time.

_I will be stronger, _the vampire in him snarled as the pain drove him near to a madness he'd long thought he'd forgotten. _I will come into my strength and then I will not allow anyone to harm me. No one will have power over me, not ever again!_

Suddenly, the sharp, piercing force of a new weapon tore into his left hand pinning it against the wall like a collector might spear a butterfly to its casing. That's all he was, a bug to this man, to all of them. But that would change. A roar of agony ripped from his lips as the flat blade was twisted and Malfoy jerked as he saw blood rolling down the wall, blood that was _boiling _from the mere presence of the white-hot weapon.

It was silver, both of these _weapons _were, Draco realised, recalling that knowledge from his third year Defence Against the Dark Arts class. He could taste the metallic tang in the air. It felt like that blow with it had sapped some of the life Potter's blood had given him. He had to get out of here.

With vampire speed he drew his wand. Alaric had had the element of surprise before and Draco had not come into his full strength yet, but the professor could not match Draco for speed.

"_Avis!" _Draco screamed and a torrent of birds erupted from his wand, flying towards the professor like a tide of bullets. He watched Alaric duck and he dove forwards, snatching his bag off the side and flying out of the room. Panic thumped frantically in his chest as he fled the Defence Against the Dark Arts floor, putting as much distance between it and him as possible.

What did this Alaric want from him? Why? What _was _he?

Another figure trapping him in perpetual, inescapable agony, it seemed. For he could never tell anyone, not if he wished to have even a _chance _at life, not if he wished for his parents to retain as much of one as possible. He could avoid being alone with Professor Alaric, however. In fact, he would make a point to from now on. _If I hope to survive another year at Hogwarts I will _have _to._

_~To Be Continued..._


	4. 4- One In The Same

Author's Note:

I made a banner for this story, it's a tad vanilla and nowhere near as good as the luscious front cover the amazing Carlesjo made for me but please take a peek if you're interested: (TAKE THE SPACES OUT) hyperli art /Drarry-San guis-Vita-Est-Banner-215042177

I hope that you're still enjoying it! :) Please review if you have time!

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.: ONE IN THE SAME :.

Thankfully no one made too big a fuss about Harry's diversion from class into bed. He'd said Professor Snape had guessed it was merely a backlash of the spell he'd used to defeat Voldemort and they had just nodded and moved on from the subject. They hadn't even questioned his mention of Professor Snape excusing him from classes. Their acceptance, no, their lackadaisical attitude left him feeling quite disgruntled for days.

He didn't know what to say to the realisation that struck him with their indifference – they didn't care, or at least, he wasn't at the forefront of their minds anymore. _Of course not, _he scolded himself, not wanting to sound pitiable, even in his own head. _They have each other now and can afford to be together without fearing either one of them will be killed. _He bowed out gracefully, remaining quiet as they sat around the fireplace in the common room, him tucked into the corner of the settee, them on the rug below, with Hermione patiently trying to help Ron with their Charms work.

It was the first Saturday of the term and he kept his head down, focussing hard on his letter to Remus and Tonks, allowing his two friends to chat without interruption from him. But the letter 'home' was hard. He kept sounding far too forced and then too sarcastic or bitter, and now he had eliminated all of those, there was hardly any _body _to his simple words.

_Bloody fantastic, _he thought, frustrated, _they invite me into their family and I cant even write a decent letter home to them. _He had become an awful, wretched thing somewhere along the line. The words he had once spoken to Sirius echoed ominously in his head. _"What if I am becoming bad?" _He feared that was exactly what was happening.

"Harry? Harry are you even in there, mate?"

Ron's voice shook him from his sinister dwellings and Harry glanced down to see both him and Hermione staring up at him impatiently. They had obviously been vying for his attention for a few minutes now.

"Yeah, sorry…writing to Remus is harder than I thought." He flicked his eyes down to the paper and back to them again. "It's not like writing to Sirius, there's more…pressure to say the right thing. I don't know why, since with Sirius I always had to write as if we were being watched, but–"

"You're not used to having a stable family," Hermione cut across him, her smile warm even though her words sounded far too rehearsed to his ears. He'd barely said a word to them the last few days and when he tried they seemed to head him off. As if afraid of where his words would end up…

"It's something you'll get used to," she continued, "And Remus and Tonks love you. They understand. It'll all work out alright, Harry."

"Just think, Christmas time with them will be amazing!" Ron chimed in. Although, if he'd been paying attention, he would've seen Harry wince at his words. That was right, of course, with his own home in Siddlebury cottage, the usual invitation to the Burrow wouldn't be extended.

_ Stop whining you ungrateful git, _he spat at himself. _No wonder they don't want to talk to you if all you do is sit there feeling sorry for yourself. It's like you're still _living _the bloody war!_

"Have you seen Malfoy at all today, Harry?" Hermione asked then. Harry frowned, his stomach muscles tensing with wariness.

"No," he replied quickly, with the truth. Malfoy had been gone from his bed every morning he'd woken up and was already in bed every night he went up to sleep. He would've thought it'd be the other way around, being as vampires didn't naturally walk around in the day. He paused then. How _did _Malfoy walk around during the day?

"Why? Should I make it my priority to know where the prat is?" he asked defensively.

Hermione's brow furrowed. "If you want to have a hope of completing your Charms homework you should. And you know that as you were absent for the first Defence lesson you're his seating partner there as well by default."

Harry swore under his breath. Yes, he did know, he'd discovered this by finding everyone already at seats when he stumbled into the next day's defence class. It was lucky they were only revising, he hadn't had to speak to Malfoy at all since the incident a few days ago. In fact…now he thought about it, Malfoy seemed to be avoiding him purposefully, practically hanging off the side of his chair to avoid touching him or breathing his air.

"I'll catch up with the git later," he mumbled, folding his letter neatly, thereby declaring it finished. "I had better take this to one of the school owls and send it off before Remus thinks something's happened to me." He got to his feet, not surprised that they did not move to follow.

"Oh," Hermione said in an odd voice, "Do you…maybe want to meet back up then?" she asked. "Maybe we can all do our Charms and Defence Against the Dark Arts homework together?"

Somehow, the image of the three of them at a table with Draco Malfoy doing homework civilly didn't work in his head.

"Depends how arsey his royal highness is feeling today," Harry said. It was only partially true, of course. He could see how uncomfortable they looked. How they wanted to get away to be alone. _Bow out gracefully, _his mind echoed. And he did.

After talking his way out of the door, Harry slowly made his way out of the castle. The September air was bitter and chilly today and he found himself wishing he'd brought his scarf by the time he reached the wooden bridge. This place made him nostalgic. It made him think of Remus and their first talk about his mother…

He clutched the letter tighter to his chest.

He felt as lost now as he did then, confused, almost hurt. Hogwarts was his home and he was happy to be there, but at the same time, he longed for the subtle comfort of Siddlebury cottage. Then, in all honesty, he was terrified of both, of belonging to either, to any one place. Anything he had ever grabbed hold of, anything he had belonged to or had belonged to him had been torn away. Even his poor owl. Hence the trip to the Owlery.

"Where are you off to, Potter?"

Harry froze as that voice rippled through his ears for the first time in days. It was almost the first time he had been the sole focus of _anyone _in days. He did not turn but he remained still as the sound of those footsteps carried through the wooden bridge, which was thankfully empty besides the two of them.

Finally, the footsteps stopped. Harry raised his chin, staring boldly into those rich, grey eyes.

"Not that it's any of your business, Malfoy, but I'm going to send a letter," he explained flippantly. "Could you mind out of my way so that I can send this before lunch time?" With that, he made to move past his obstruction only to find it had moved directly into his path. He glared furiously up into Malfoy's eyes. "What is it now?" he demanded.

Malfoy raised a delicate brow, but now that he was this close and focussing on him, Harry could see it. That skin was so deathly pale that those veins were vibrantly blue beneath it. Those eyes were hungry, his face was gaunt. He understood now, but Malfoy confirmed it in words nonetheless.

"I last fed on Monday, it is now Saturday. We agreed three days but it has now been five," Malfoy said silkily, his body shifting to arch a hairsbreadth closer to Harry. Harry wanted to flinch back, but forced himself not to move.

"Of course, your _fix_," Harry sneered. "Look we didn't set a specific day. But if you want to be on such strict schedule–"

"Naturally I do when it concerns my life," Draco interjected. Harry grinded his teeth.

"If you _want _to be on such strict schedule, we'll say Wednesday evenings after dinner and Saturdays. Sound suitable to you?" He was trying to sound mature but he could hear the sarcasm in his voice. Strangely enough, however, instead of using it as means of an argument, Malfoy just nodded agreeably.

"I concur," Malfoy said softly, his eyes dipping just enough to tell Harry that they were drinking in the sight of his throat.

"Hungry?" Harry asked derisively. Draco said nothing. To this silence, Harry shrugged and simply moved around Malfoy to continue on his path up to the Owlery. His footsteps were now shadowed, however. A low sigh tumbled over his lips and he carried on walking. He couldn't avoid this forever, he supposed.

"We have homework for both Charms and Defence," Harry said as they passed the stone circle and headed up to the Owlery. He saw Malfoy flinch at the last word, however, and frowned. "What's wrong with you?"

"Nothing," Malfoy replied quickly, following behind him. "We can work on our homework after I feed." There was a distinctive pause in his speech then and Harry knew that his brain was working frantically. He could practically hear the cogs whirring. Then, "If that's…alright with you?" Draco added.

Harry nearly choked on his spittle at that and almost gave a little smirk. Almost. "You think ravaging my neck in the open is the best idea?" Harry asked.

"Professor Snape gave us permission to use his private rooms to ensure we won't be discovered – he won't be there," he added quickly when he saw Potter's expression. The rest of the trip up to where the owls rested was quiet after that.

In his silence, however, Draco witnessed Potter's lost look, his sadness. It was so painfully similar to his own that it made his hungry body ache with the reminder. When he was thinking about Potter, he didn't usually think about his predicament in life. In fact, this was the first time he had thought about anything other than sex and blood whilst looking at Potter since he'd been changed. Was this sympathy in pain stronger than his thirst? He wasn't so sure anything could be more powerful. It frightened him sometimes how strong it was…

And yet the pain in Potter's eyes as he caressed the greying barn owl at the back of the head, it was positively heart-wrenching.

"Didn't you have your own owl?" Draco said then, confused. "The small white one."

Potter turned to look on him, his eyes shining treacherously. "I did. She died."

"Oh," Draco murmured, not really sure what to say to such a blunt statement. That was another thing that unnerved him about his sudden interest in Potter. It rendered him useless at things he had been previously excellent at. He had always taken pride in his articulate, witty ways. And now…

"How did she die?" he asked, watching Potter's face harden.

"When I was moved from my Aunt and Uncle's house for safety on my seventeenth birthday. The Death Eaters ambushed us, Hedwig tried to protect me," Potter explained, trying to sound unaffected. But the emotion drowned his voice. Potter was incapable of masking emotion adequately. And besides which, Draco could smell his dejection.

Potter turned then, gazing through the glassless window and out into the murky mid-morning that the owl had taken off into. Potter shivered as a brutal breeze burst through the Owlery. He ran his hands up and down his arms distractedly. "Another thing lost because I cared about it…"

Draco watched him a moment more, his dead chest clenching with pained spasms that weren't truly his own. Potter's heart was hurting, and had been for some time now.

"Here," Draco said then, taking off his robe (merely a ornamental to him) and offering it to Potter.

Finally Potter tore his gaze from the horizon, frowning at his offering even as he took it. But did not put it on. He clutched it thoughtfully for a moment, thankfully it was a simple black winter robe, not a slytherin one, or else Potter might have refused it outright and started another row.

"Is it cursed?" Potter asked, a hint of a joke in his voice. Draco barely withheld a smirk.

"I just happen to like my meals warm," he said simply.

Potter scowled at that, but only to hide the slight blush dusting his cheeks, Draco thought. It was almost to surreal, that they could be having a conversation without animosity.

"The way the Prophet tells it, you live with the werewolf that taught here in our third year, now," Draco said conversationally as they headed back to the castle. He couldn't help but wonder why he was even bothering to make small talk with someone who hated him with a passion.

"Remus Lupin," the man corrected him sharply, a glare accompanying his words as he pulled Draco's fur-lined robe closer around him. It really was freezing today, he supposed. To humans. "And yes I am, his wife is your cousin, Nymphadora Tonks."

Draco nodded vaguely, he knew of Andromeda Tonks of course.

"Remus was friends, best friends with my father and godfather," Potter elaborated.

"So you had nowhere else to go then? I thought you were an honorary Weasel?" Draco asked, expecting to provoke some fire in those eyes, but the mention of Weasley seemed to have him almost as melancholy as the mention of his dead owl.

"I can't spend my whole life round there. The Weasleys have their own lives and…well, Ron and Hermione are together, they need space. They don't need a third wheel rolling along behind them."

Draco understood then, it all made perfect sense. Somehow it had all clicked into place with the snippets of information he had gathered over the last few minutes. "I see, that's why you're wandering around looking for somewhere quiet to mope then," he said. Potter stopped, whirling on his feet to face him. They had reached the wooden bridge again and it creaked menacingly beneath Potter's steps, heavy with fury. "Ever since we returned to school you've been shying away from everything, you barely even talk to those two _'friends' _of yours. You look like you're in your own bloody world most of the time, and a world of misery at that."

"Says you!" Potter snarled, invading his personal space, his body shaking with anger as well as cold now. "The only time you've acted alive is when you've been shadowing me like a bad smell! Where do you get off judging my life? You don't even have one! You're _dead_!"

Draco gave an other-worldly, animalistic snarl. He threw himself at Potter, slamming him against the side of the bridge, hearing it groan in negation at the force. Potter hissed, his hand catching on the rough splinters of wood and gouging a few droplets of precious blood from his palm. The sweet, musky smell rolled up Draco's nostrils, steaming up his mind with the hunger he had been struggling to repress for days, the arousal that was still not sated.

The incident with Alaric had made it worse, the hunger. His body _would _have been able to wait the few days, but after being assaulted like that, his supplies were diminished. He was famished once again, not on the verge of death like before but on the verge of doing something very unforgiveable to Potter if he didn't put some distance between them. And _now_!

"Be very careful, Potter, you seem to forget what I am. I'm not the schoolboy you've fought with all these years–"

"You're still the same ponce I've been trying to take down a peg or two, you're still so far up your arse you can't see sunlight – only now it's because it'll _kill _you if you don't!" Potter snapped back. "You're terrified of accepting what you are, you fight it every step of the way. You don't even accept that the vampire and you are the same thing! And yet you follow me around because the only time your rotten heart beats is when you're making my life even more miserable than yours!"

With another growl, Draco seized Potter's wounded hand, bringing it up so that he could watch the smear of blood run down Potter's hot palm. So warm, he was practically burning in his icy grasp. If he didn't know better he'd fear his own ivory skin might melt. He felt himself salivating, panting and was only anchored to reality by Potter struggling to steal his hand back.

"Our lives are equally miserable," Draco conceded, not lowering that captive hand, in fact leaning closer to sniff the crimson line of fluid like a beverage he must savour. He inhaled the scent deeply before speaking again, his voice husky with want. "But you are just as lifeless as me and as you said, _I'm dead._" The latter was so soft a hiss that it was almost lost on the wind, which rippled through their hair, across their skin. It made Potter shudder again.

"And another thing, _Potter,_" Draco all-but purred, "The only time your bitter little heart shows any sign of life is when I provoke you…" He leant in closer, so that his breath danced across Potter's cheeks which were flushed with anger, blood just beneath the skin. Yes, he'd never looked more alive. "When I _bite _you," Draco concluded and before Potter could say another word he raised that palm to his lips and lapped slowly, _seductively _at the minute wound.

A sharp intake of breath from Potter and the scent of arousal bolting through Draco's nose told him exactly how Potter felt about the way he curled the blood on the very tip of his tongue, making sure to tickle that hot palm as he did so.

"N-No!" Harry gasped out, voice raspy. "N-Not… Not here, someone will see us!"

Draco could not help but chuckle at the half-heartedness of that request. He lapped at Potter's palm a bit more, sealing the wound and tasting his untainted blood a second more before stepping back. There needed to be space between them or he would jump him right there. It was a miracle someone hadn't come along already…

"To Professor Snape's private quarters, Potter, or I won't be held responsible."

Harry shot down the bridge at a brusque walk, desperate to put some distance between them so that he could compose himself on the way down to the dungeons. No one had ever touched him like this before, that was the only reason seven years of hatred was so easily overcome with a little zap of arousal.

_And Malfoy is a vampire too, _he reminded himself, giving himself excuses. _His spit does weird things to humans, that's the whole point, that I can't control myself…_

_ But you can't control yourself with the Temporentia Sensium either, _the very 'Malfoy' like voice reminded him. His flushed skin heated even more and he hastened his steps, feeling Malfoy following at a safe distance behind. Whatever Malfoy may have said about him being the only thing to make him feel alive, Harry was sure this would be the death of him.

_His weird spit thing, _he told himself over and over again as he headed towards the ominous shadow of Snape's rooms. _That's the only reason my heart won't stop beating, why my body feels so hot…_

For the first time he wished he'd had the chance to experience sex before now, so that he might compare what he was feeling now to real sex. So he would know if this was just a vampire thing or sex thing.

It took too long, and yet not long enough for them to reach that same dimly lit room they had done that awful deed in a few days ago. It was the same as before. The fire was burning in the hearth, casting a forebodingly warm glow over the room. This time though, there were the additional enchanted candles floating overhead, only adding to his unease. A trickle of sweat dribbled down the back of his neck.

Suddenly, he felt a gentle pressure on his shoulder and he leapt back, nearly jumping out of his skin. Yes. He was far too on edge. Malfoy raised a brow at him, evidently enjoying the sight of him flustered, frustrated and confused.

"Let's get this over with," Harry grumbled. He swore his skin was itching with apprehension. Or maybe that was just the heat.

"Drink this," Malfoy said, pressing a small vial of familiar potion into Potter's hand. Harry gulped it down, finding it hard to swallow his throat was so dry. Then, came the stunning blow.

"Take the robe off," Malfoy instructed.

Potter's eyes went wide. Even though he had stripped off his robe without thinking the first time, it seemed far more forbidden now he gave thought to it. Now that Malfoy was coherent. Now that his cock was already hard from that teasing touch of that tongue earlier. "What?" he asked dumbly, as if Malfoy had spoken in a foreign language.

"It is expensive and I won't have it sullied with blood," Draco said, his voice husky now with desire. "And besides which, you'll be more comfortable this way."

Still, Potter did not budge. He just stood there gawping at him.

Huffing impatiently, his hunger and lust both roaring in his ears, Draco spanned the gap between them, his hands reaching for the fur-lined robe still wrapped around Potter's body.

Finally Potter moved. He flinched when Draco's hands seized the collar of the borrowed robe and pushed it off his shoulders.

"This isn't a bloody romance novel," Potter rasped out, the robe sliding off of his shoulders and pooling at his feet. He no doubt felt worryingly naked in only his shirt and trousers now. "There's no need for all this seduction. I'm just your dinner."

"Do make up your mind what you want then, Potter, since I am clearly not the only one confused about what I am," Draco whispered, punctuating his words by edging forwards. His hands slid up Potter's throat, hovering just above that blisteringly hot flesh. His own was slowly heating in such proximity to that warmth. He watched Potter's lips move soundlessly, striving for speech. Potter shuddered and Draco drank it in, caressing the shape of Potter's jaw, then his cheekbones, feeling the flush there warm him. Damn the life he felt flourish in his chest at the feel of him, the taste…

"Careful, Malfoy," Potter panted, "I might get the impression you fancy me."

"Never," Draco growled breathily, "I just fancy the idea of life very much."

Potter frowned. "Don't flirt with me," he warned him, "I won't be used by anyone again. I'm not yours. I'm not anything to you but sustenance. You have no chance with me, not ever."

"We'll see about that," Draco sneered, his fangs gleaming in the soft light now. He could just _see _Potter crawling on his knees, begging for a bit of heavy petting. Begging for _him. _Yes, he quite liked that image of the power he could have over Potter, the most powerful wizard in the world, especially in light of the fact that he needed the idiot's blood to survive. "We're one in the same, Potter. Don't act like you're better than me." He stole the breath from those lungs then, seizing the hair at Potter's nape and tugging his head to the side. All that unsettling intimacy was gone now, he hoped, it made Potter incredibly bad tempered. And it disturbed him how good the prat smelled when he was angry.

_This definitely is a curse,_ he thought, the vampire in him disagreeing as he smoothed his mouth over that arched throat. "I've been thinking, Potter," Draco breathed over that sweat-dampened skin, his tongue flickering out to lap at his throbbing pulse. "It would explain a lot of if Blaise's words from the start of term held some truth." He felt Potter freeze in his arms, his body angry but not tense. No, it was soft and pliable from the _Temporentia Sensium_.

Draco grazed his throat with his fangs, unable to resist savouring this pre-ecstasy even as famished as he was. The vampire wanted the poetry of it, the seduction. It was its _hunt_. Then, he elaborated on his previous words, "Are you a virgin, Potter?"

Potter's fingers dug into his shoulders, trying desperately to tear his inhumanly strong skin. Failing. "You prick," he snarled, fighting the potion in his determination to be angry. "You're doing the molesting, you sick-head! I'm just reacting to friction and hormones!" He shoved at Draco roughly, still trapped in his grasp. "You just can't keep your hands off me, can you?" Potter sneered.

Draco saw red then. Nobody had mocked him since he had been under Fenrir Greyback's mercy. And no one would again if he could help it. He could not help but endure Alaric's torture if he hoped to retain a low profile, to keep away from dark spells and anything suspicious. But he'd rip out his own throat before he let Potter walk all over him. His eyes flashed with a lethal mix of fury, hunger and lust. A growl of all three flew from his throat. A flash of his fangs were the only further warning before he seized Potter by his hair and sank those fangs into his throat.

A startled groan escaped his victim, and he drank that in as greedily as the blood flowing out over his tongue. His fingers tightened in Potter's hair and he pulled their bodies tightly together, grinding his hips into Potter's as he drank.

_So good! _He thought, his body lost to the frenzy but his mind sharp thanks to the _Temporentia Sensium. _He was fully aware of every little breath that flittered into Potter's lungs, every dribble of sweat…

****CENSORED. FOR THE FULL CHAPTER WITH LOVE SCENES PLEASE SEE THE LINKS ON MY PROFILE****

The pants Potter emitted were pained now, his fingers still clawing at his, Draco's shoulders as if he were fighting a battle in his head - feel more pleasure or push his captor away.

_That's it Potter, _Draco thought venomously, sucking harder. _Feel what I feel. Confused. Helpless. A slave to your own instincts – an animal!_

"I'm not an animal!" Potter screamed then, his voice breaking with the intensity of his fury. Draco's eyes widened and he pulled back, staring into those fiery green eyes and seeing himself in them, hyper-aware of every fleck in those depths now that he had fed. Now he had been restored from Alaric's attack.

He could feel Potter's heat, his anger like it was something solid caressing him, grazing his skin with the intent to harm but not the conviction. They were both panting. Potter with anger, arousal, exertion, he, Draco, with vitality, desire and no little amount of apprehension.

"Did you just read my bloody mind, Potter?!" he demanded, scowling.

"I'm not an animal," Potter repeated, his voice dangerously raspy. "I'm not. I'm _not_…!"

Draco chuckled mirthlessly, wiping Potter's blood from his mouth. His eyes were dilated and rich again now, staring at the wasting blood rolling down Potter's neck where he hadn't sealed the wound yet. Potter was clutching at it with his hand, still too angry to feel the hurt that would be starting to ebb at his senses with Draco's saliva drying.

"Struck a nerve, have I?" Malfoy sneered. "You plucked that thought right out of my mind – how?"

But it seemed Potter could not see past that initial insult. It was a raw point with him for some reason. Blood was still trickling through his fingers slowly and Malfoy gave a sigh of indignation, stepping closer. "Let me close the wound at least before you storm off in a mood."

"I have a bloody wand!" Potter snapped.

"No spell can heal a vampire bite, just as no spell can heal a werewolf bite, not as well as a the attacker's own saliva anyway. If you want to have a new scar to show your oblivious friends then by all means, run away like a coward."

That face hardened. "I'm not a coward or an animal. Don't brand me your own labels to try and make yourself feel better," Potter growled, tilting his head to the side reluctantly.

Draco scowled, wanting to look (and desperate to _feel) _revolted as he approached Potter and lowered his head to the crying wound. His eyes fluttered shut and he sealed the wound with his mouth, lathing the pierced flesh with soft, continuous passes of his tongue. The breath in Potter's chest fluctuated unnaturally, his arms held tense by his side, as if struggling not to push him away or claw at him in ecstasy – or both.

Draco strained to hear some stray thought of Potter's, strived to make his own mental insults reach Potter again in experiment, but nothing happened. Potter remained rigid under him and when he, Draco pulled back once the wound completely healed, there was still no echo of either of their thoughts in the other's head. He would have to speak to Severus about this later…

"You're welcome," Draco grumbled sarcastically, watching as Potter huffed and started to clothe his upper body once more. He didn't know which he was more intrigued about, the fact that Potter had somehow stolen thoughts from his head without realising, or the way in which a few little words seemed to get under his skin. Granted, Potter was a hot-headed imbecile, with a temper of the like Draco had never seen, but it was still curious.

Casting a refreshing cleansing spell on himself to eradicate the smell of blood and sweat and arousal, Draco could not help but notice that his arousal, while gone, had been replaced by frustration. It seemed to be the same with Potter. "You composed yourself a bit better this time," he mused, so that Potter could hear. "I was right, wasn't I? When I fed from you, that was the first kind of…_sexual _touch you'd had with anyone else, wasn't it?"

Harry glowered at him. "I've kissed two girls, I wank like any bloke does and then…_this, _whatever this is, with you." He shuddered, as if the very subject was repulsive. "It must've been nice for you to have _time _to think about nothing but sex like any other bloke our age but I didn't – I never had the luxury. So before you take the piss out of me for being a virgin whose thighs you couldn't floss between, think really hard about _why _it was I never had the luxury of _half _the things most my age have."

To that, Draco merely chuckled. "_'…Floss between' _that's a good one, Potter, I'm disappointed that I didn't come up with that myself." He reached for the blood replenishing potion that Severus had left, passing it roughly to Potter and watching him down the neatly measured dose. "Care to explain why you're so touchy about being cast in the same light as me?" Draco persisted.

"Because we're such good friends that share everything?" Potter bit out sarcastically. "I owe you no explanation. In case you haven't noticed, there are things about the war, about myself, about _Voldemort _that I haven't even shared with Ron and Hermione."

Draco's eyes gleamed then. Potter was strong and powerful, _beautiful _in his sheer strength, but he was not cool and calculating – that was Draco. _Like fire and ice, _the vampire hissed in his head, _opposites drawn together like ends of a magnet_. "So this is about the Dark Lord, then." It was a statement, not a question that left his lips and the way that Potter's face twisted with fury told him he was correct. "About how you were used by weaker men, _forged _into a weapon. They made you kill the Dark Lord–"

"I didn't kill him!" Potter screamed, "I didn't! It wasn't me. The _spell _killed him!" He said the last words with such darkness and conviction that Draco wondered just how many nights Potter lay awake repeating those words over and over again, struggling to convince himself. Fighting to remove the darkness that had swelled within him on taking another's life. It had not affected Draco when he had ripped the vampire that had turned him apart. He was more changed by the bite, the self-loathing of what he now was than becoming a murderer. Perhaps it was the vampire blood coursing through him now, or the thirst for blood but he felt nothing on taking life. Least of all the life of someone who had ruined his own.

Of course, Potter was a noble, foolhardy Gryffindor, he would of course torment himself over it for the rest of eternity…

_Which, lucky for him, he must spend with me, lest I rot away slowly from the inside out, _Draco thought bitterly.

"I'm sorry, I just cant comprehend you being _upset _in taking a life which was so cruel, barely human, a life that would have meant the death of all those you hold dear," Malfoy sighed, shaking his head.

"You don't have to understand it, that's the beauty of detachment," Potter replied aloofly, finally dressed again. "No one understands it, not even the people I'm closest to, that's why I don't talk about it, alright? Now if you'll excuse me…" He made to brush past Malfoy then, heading for the door.

"Tell me, Potter, when you pictured life after the war, did it look like this?" Draco asked. He watched Potter freeze, his hand immobile on the ornate, snake-shaped door handle.

"What?" the Chosen one breathed, his voice husky with horror. Horror that Malfoy had managed to strike a nerve again, play all the most sensitive areas of the darkness inside of him.

"You don't speak with your friends, your makeshift family, you shove everyone away in case you get burned, in case you might get _used _again. But what type of life has that left you with?" There was no answer. Draco grinned maliciously, darting across the room with lightning speed, pinning Potter to the door with his body. One hand settled on the wrist near the door handle, the other slammed into the door near Potter's head. He enjoyed the tiny flinch, but enjoyed even more the laboured breathing, the tint of arousal in the air. Oh yes, Potter hated him. Potter was angry, but he was so fucking hard Draco could _taste _it on the air.

_He's been hard for a long time too, I bet, bound to an unspoken oath of forced celibacy. No wonder he has a bloody awful temper, _Draco thought, squeezing the wrist he held captive. "You're a bitter old man before your time, a shell. Take it from someone whose not allowed to live for themselves – this is no way to live."

"Y-You…" The stutter in Potter's voice was mouth-watering. "You think you know me?" Potter demanded shakily. "Just because our lives were both ruined that day in the dungeon, just because we've both lost nearly everything, it doesn't mean you know me."

"I know you better than anyone in these castle walls, Potter, perhaps beyond," Draco told him, his voice low and droning, his vampire's doing, not his own. It was almost instinct to use that voice with Potter now. "What does that say about you? If your school rival knows you better than your loved ones?"

"I-It…it's better that they don't know the person that I am now," Potter insisted, closing his eyes in an attempt to shut out the truth in Draco's words. "They all suffered as well, they're entitled to their happiness now, without me trouncing all over it with my problems." He paused a moment, gnawing on the corner of his lower lip anxiously. "There's nothing anyone can do to make my problems better anyway, and when they try it's…it makes everything worse. I just want them to be happy, and if that means I just fade–"

"Ever the bloody martyr, Potter," Draco snarled scathingly. "Do you even realise how pathetic that sounds? Who is it going to please if you sacrifice yourself needlessly? If you _fade away_? Did it not occur to you that your friends _want you _because you're pivotal to their happiness? What would it achieve to disappear?"

Potter's shoulders slumped in misery and Draco snarled again, whirling Potter around to face him, slamming him _hard _into the door. Not once, _twice, _wanting nothing more than to knock some sense into him. Everything had been taken from Draco, and here Potter was, with a second chance to start afresh and he was pissing his life away!

"Poor Saint Potter!" he hissed venomously, "Lost his parents, lost his godfather. Everyone loses people, Potter. Granted you had a childhood ripped from you seventeen years ago but what good does it achieve to lay around wallowing in the misery of something that happened years ago?! You lost the first eighteen years of your life, don't you think it's about time you started to take some of it back? To _live _a little? The way those that died would've _wanted_?!"

He himself nearly salivated at the thought of when he would come into his full powers, giving him the unrivalled power over his own life. His chest tightened when he thought of the way he had fled Alaric's office. But he was still not strong enough, not yet, and until he was he would have to endure. And until he finished at Hogwarts, he would have to do everything he could to keep his nature hidden.

The memory of Snape's words to him as he had first stepped inside the castle this term had stuck with him. He would have to lay low, not only because of what he was, but because of the crimes the Wizengamot had cleared him of not a few weeks ago. He was already under enough suspicion as an ex-death eater. No unforgivables, no fatal curses. If he drew negative attention to himself and the wrong people found out what he was before he could finish Hogwarts…

"I can't believe you of all people are preaching to me," Potter snapped, shoving him hard, cutting through his reverie. Draco pressed him more firmly into the door again. "You hypocritical prick. Who was it wandering around griping about not being fully human or _perfect _anymore! You're hardly 'dead' if you're still walking around, are you?"

"Do not try to make my problems seem lesser or underestimate them. This isn't a competition of whose life is more devastated, Potter," Draco replied attempting to keep his usual, apathetic tone.

"Then don't throw my parents and everyone who I failed to save in my bloody face you prick!" Potter bellowed. "Like I don't think about their faces, the lives they could've had if I'd just been faster, stronger, _better_! I killed them, I don't need you to tell me that!"

"You didn't kill them," Draco hissed, "But you may as well have done with the way you're _pissing _away the life they fought so hard to save–"

THWACK!

Draco flew backwards, stumbling to retain his footing. His jaw throbbed menacingly, and he rubbed it as he stared at Harry, disregarding the blood that trickled from the corner of his own mouth. Had he been paying attention the movement would not have even made him flinch. It did not hurt him, not the blow per say, but his skin _tingled _menacingly, as if there had been volatile magic behind that blow as well as a fist. In his explosive temper, his thoughtless _rage, _Potter had actually wanted to hurt him.

"How _dare _you use such uncouth _muggle _conduct to place me? What are you an _animal_?!" He swore loudly as the fist swung for him again, he was faster, he was physically stronger but Potter's magic was thick in the air like smoke. It wouldn't hurt if that fist struck, but there was no telling what would happen if that magic surged beyond the point of Potter's control. Potter didn't even seem to realise his own strength.

_Just _avoiding the next blow, he seized the _chosen one's_ robes, fury burning in his eyes. Draco sneered, spitting the blood crying from his split lip into the dark-haired boy's face. The foul deed revolted him but his tactic succeeded, and Harry released him, stumbling back in disgust. "Take out your misplaced fury on me if you will, Potter," Draco growled, "but don't dare– use your _damn _wand!" He shouted the last part as he dodged Harry's next blow, barely. Though he was not sure how that was help. Even a wand could not channel this much raw power.

"I think a fist is good enough to knock a snotty little snob like you back down a few pegs, Malfoy," Harry answered through clenched teeth, his clenched hands shaking. This was wrong, so wrong. He hadn't felt this angry since…since the night he had felt Voldemort's fury race through his mind. Not his own malice, yet coursing through him like a furious, storming tide. Sirius was dead. Sirius, _all of them_ were _gone_ and Malfoy was…Malfoy was…

Draco frowned, diving into his robes for his wand. "_Locomotor Mortis!_" He shouted, and watched as Potter's legs suddenly snapped into stillness, the Gryffindor's upper-body lurching at the sudden jerk, nearly toppling over. It evidently took a moment for the dark-haired boy to realise that Draco had used his wand.

"Let me go, Malfoy," Potter said lowly, dangerously. Draco raised a brow, spanning the distance between them, and dodging a swipe from Potter's (unbound) arms.

"Do you know that my parents wont even look at me anymore, Potter?" Draco said his voice indifferent, lacking his once trademark malice. He was staring at him, at Potter with unsure eyes, a glistening look within them as he slammed Potter against the wall and sank his nails into his shoulders. At that spark of pain, at the tone of his voice, he felt as well as _saw _the power retreat, little by little. He didn't know if Potter was consciously recovering it or if something he had done had simply broken the mood, the enraged state of mind that had let it loose. But it continued to slowly simmer back with every following word.

"My father has not said anything longer than two words to me since. My mother only speaks to me with her eyes averted – she will not even touch me. I am not their son anymore. I cannot give them grandchildren. I am not pure-blooded. I could not even go out in the sunlight, except that Severus slaved away all summer until he had concocted a potion that would enable me to."

Potter's eyes widened with surprise and he, Draco, closed his for a moment, recovering his cool mask of indifference. He would not let the sadness, the loss touch his face. "Yes, Potter. He did everything in his power to enable me to live, researched and is _still _researching frantically for a cure, or something to make my _'un-life' _easier. Without him I would be locked away in my room until dusk. Truly dead to the world." Opening his eyes again, Draco squeezed Potter's shoulders harder, this time seeing pain cross that face. He felt satisfaction that for once, the idiot was listening.

"I had every reason to give up, but I didn't – _couldn't. _I will not die pitiably in my room, wasting away. I was born to achieve something and I will strive until I can make my parents proud again. Great men don't roll over and admit defeat just because it _hurts, _Potter. They take it in their bloody stride, they take that pain and they use it to make them stronger than before." His grey eyes were shadowed with darkness then, and he tried not to think of the torture Professor Alaric had exacted upon him when he next spoke.

"I am a monster. And though vampires are politically accepted in general, I cannot tell a soul what I am if I hope to remain here. I am loathed by my own parents, I am changed, but I am stronger, faster – I can do this–" He seized Potter by the throat and lifted him up into the air so that his toes dangled uselessly above the ground. Potter choked and spluttered, clawing at his fingers, but he felt nothing. "You see. I am stronger than ever before because of what happened to me. And I will use this to live the life others would have stolen from me."

After letting Potter choke and struggle for a few moments, he let him down, satisfied that he was gasping for air and rubbing at his abused throat. "Get over yourself, Potter," he said coldly, opening the door behind them at last. "You're not the worst off. There are others who have a lot less than you."

Potter stared at him with an odd expression on his face, confusion, enlightenment, perhaps?

"Snape said that," Potter said, more to himself than to Draco.

"He was right," Draco said smoothly, and with that, he glided from the room without as much as a second glance back at the Boy Who Lived.

Harry was plagued by his own outburst as well as Malfoy's words all the way back up to the eighth year common room. The day had brightened up a bit and most of the eighth years seemed to be outside now, leaving only Hermione and Ron, exactly as he'd left them, curled up on the rug by the fireplace. Harry could not help but smile, albeit a little sadly. There was a book between them, but they were close and whispering to each other lovingly, in a way Harry could not help but envy. He would never have that.

"Hi," Harry said quietly, almost afraid they would hear him. They looked up immediately however, uneasy smiles on both of their faces.

"Harry," Hermione said warmly, "Did you find Malfoy?"

Harry winced. After Malfoy's lecture he'd forgotten what he'd originally needed him for. His mind hissed at that. He did not need Malfoy.

Slowly, he crossed the room, taking a seat on the settee behind them again. "He wasn't as agreeable as I might have hoped," he said, "I'll try him again later when he's in less of a mood."

Hermione gave him an agreeable nod, turning back to her book. Ron remained silent.

Harry could not help but hear Malfoy's words in his head, over and over again. They melded with his own thoughts, his own confusing world and he closed his eyes to stave off the pain that threatened to well up inside of him. His entire body tensed as it hadn't been able to before he had walked off the _Temporentia Sensium, _but his downfall was the little lost gasp that escaped his lips.

When he opened his eyes again, both of his friends had separated and were staring at him with concern ebbing at their features.

"Harry? Mate, what's the matter?" Ron asked, looking a little lost himself.

Hermione leant forwards, petting his knee softly. "Harry, we're your best friends. Tell us?"

Harry shrank back into the settee. He closed his eyes as tears began to well up and tried to swallow them back, but they were already clinging to his lashes. "I didn't think that…" He choked, he lost his voice, his fingers clawing into his thighs until he thought he'd broken the skin. His head hung limply on his shoulders. He didn't want them to be this close, to see him this weak. This _broken. _

_I'm supposed to be stronger than this, _he told himself. To no avail. He was splitting at the seams after years of pressure. Malfoy's scathing words had only just made him realise how bad it had been. But he wasn't sure what to do now.

"I thought that once we…got rid of Voldemort that it would be 'happy ever after'," he breathed. "But it…it's not. My parents, Sirius, Dumbledore, anyone who I dared to get close to is still dead. None of them are…are here to tell me what to do, how to be strong and I…" He chewed at his lip determinedly, loathe to allow those tears to spill down his cheeks.

"I closed myself off when Sirius died and now I…I don't even… Oh, Merlin, _help me_!" Harry gasped, giving a dry sob and Hermione surged forwards, wrapping her arms around Harry, squeezing him tightly. He felt Ron's hand on his shoulder, squeezing uncertainly, and he felt his insides churn with shame. He was going to be sick, he was sure. But his mouth was still moving, sound was still coming out that he was so desperately clamouring to grab back.

"I don't know how to let anyone back in, I don't think that I…

I don't think I can feel things like I did before I… Voldemort is gone but I feel just as lost and…Malfoy, he said that… But he was right. I – I don't…I don't know how to live…"

There was a moment of silence. He struggled to calm his frantic breathing, the shameful sounds of dry sobs in his voice. Then, Hermione drew back a fraction to look at him. Reluctantly, he met her eyes.

"Of course it isn't happy ever after just because _He _is dead. You endured so much Harry and…with everything that happened in Surrey as well, you just can't expect miracles. None of us do, we're trying. We _all _are. The war changed things, especially you. You were used as a weapon, Harry."

"It shouldn't be this hard," Harry murmured, "Just to get up in the morning. Just to feel anything besides _anger_–"

"Look, Harry," Hermione said imploringly. "It's like the soldiers that go away to war – they are trained, made into killing machines and then when their job is done, they come home and they just…they cant function as they used to. It can take years for them to find themselves again."

"Years," Harry repeated hopelessly. He shook his head, pressing as far back into the settee as he could go. He didn't want them this close to his breakdown. "I cant wait that long to feel something aside from anger and misery. I'll go mad. It shouldn't be this hard just to feel, not after everything that…" He winced, feeling the despair surging up into his throat like vomit.

"Even this, right now, don't you feel it?" he demanded. "It shouldn't be this hard for you to talk to me!"

"Of course it's hard, Harry!" Hermione cried. "We went through a lot together and you, you're different. You're so full of bitterness for what you've lost that you cant see what you _have_! It's almost as if you don't think you deserve to have a life after Voldemort. You're constantly making excuses to duck away from any kind of comfort or warmth because you're afraid–"

"I'm not afraid!" Harry insisted.

Beside Hermione, Ron shook his head, finally finding his voice. "Tell that to Lupin and Tonks, mate." At that, Harry glared, but this did not deter his red-headed friend. "They wanted you in their family, Harry, they spent ages looking for a house they thought you'd like and you don't even bloody act like you give a crap about them!"

"Of course I care!" Harry snapped. "I care about all of you! I just don't want to be a burden to you. You're all…you're all recovering from what happened in the war so much faster than me. You…you two have each other, Remus has Tonks, you all have _someone. _Whoever I ask for help, I am intruding on something. I didn't risk my life facing Voldemort so that I could ruin all of your well-deserved happiness."

"That's the most stupid thing I've ever heard anyone say," Ron snarled. "You're our friend! Your problems aren't a burden you git! We care about you!"

"You've barely spoken to me since we got back to Hogwarts!" Harry reminded them. "And I don't mind that you're spending more time alone, I don't. But don't preach to me that I'm not a burden when I obviously am. You couldn't even spare time apart to ask me why I was laid up in bed the other day, why it was _Snape _that had to help me." He shoved off the couch and up to his feet then. He knew it, they couldn't understand. "Perhaps it's just easier on you if I stay away from you," he said, moving towards the door.

"Don't try to pull that one, mate," Ron snapped, leaping to his feet also. "I know you have some martyr complex, but don't try and spin this on us. We've been trying, just like you, except we're not as quick to give up as you–"

"_Ron_!" Hermione tried to silence him, but he ignored her.

"No, he needs to hear this," Ron insisted, turning his gaze back to Harry. "Your life's difficult mate, but that's no excuse. A lot of people's are."

"Everyone keeps saying that," Harry growled.

"Because it's true!" Ron shouted. "If everyone gave up as quickly as you have since _You Know Who _there'd be no world left! You lost something in that dungeon mate, but rather than try to live long enough to find it, find _yourself _again, you're ready to drop dead."

"Just because someone else might be more wounded than me, it doesn't make my pain any easier! You know _nothing _about what happened to me!" Harry screamed. "_Nothing_!"

"And whose fault is that precisely?" Ron muttered, "You're right, mate, you're closed off. But we can't help you until you let us in. Let _someone _in! Stop trying to use everyone as an excuse to run away just _in case _you get hurt or you'll end up with no one at all!"

Harry winced, staggering backwards towards the door as if struck by a curse. "There's no _in case,_" Harry murmured, "Everyone I've ever let inside has caused me hurt in some way or another. I've got no fight in me left to survive that kind of pain again." He paused, staring at them thoughtfully. Sadly. Angrily. He could not feel anything else besides those emotions. "And besides, I don't have it in me to _love _anything like I used to. And in _trying _to come to you, in _trying _to get your help I've received nothing but a lecture and a headache. I think this is proof enough of why I'm better off not letting anyone in." With that he gave them a final look before turning on his heel and disappearing through the door. He wasn't strong enough to deal with this anymore. He didn't have any strength left in him at all.

_~To Be Continued..._


	5. 5- Intensity and Honesty

.: INTENSITY AND HONESTY :.

The midnight black sky above was lightless except for the occasional twinkle of a daring star, fighting amongst the darkness of the sky above to be seen. The new moon was lost in the sky and the trees below groaned ominously in the September wind, their branches whipped from side to side in erratic formation. Like furious waves beating against a cliff-face.

Two Shadows moved through the dimness beneath the canopy, quietly, stealthily. The shadows were alive. They studied the life of the forest around them, listening, _waiting _for something it seemed. "We don't need to bother with this rubbish," a sharp, bark of a voice cut through the quiet of the night. The owner of the voice, the largest shadow halted abruptly. Its companion stopped too, turning to face him slowly.

"We do," the second shadow assured him, leaning against the nearest tree and studying the dark glade they had stopped in. "You were there, you know as well as I that to be overconfident in this is reckless. The Dark Lord himself fell with such mistakes, we will be much wiser than he."

The first shadow gave a little grumble of impatience and folded his dirty, hairy arms over his muscled chest, also staring around the dell, his gold, _animal _eyes spotting movement far off in the distance where his companion's could not. The golden orbs _glowed _in the darkness and the second shadow looked away, unnerved by the sight of them. He wasn't entirely comfortable with Fenrir Greyback, despite their unlikely partnership.

The silence that fell was a short-lived one, as a sharp gust of wind ripped through the clearing and with it brought the sound of the others' arrival. Greyback and the smaller shadow stepped forward into the glade, but kept their bodies tensed, apprehensive of betrayal. One could not be too careful these days. The ministry was under a new rule, the new Minister, Shacklebolt a sight better than his previous three predecessors, and any underground dealings could be sabotaged by an inside spy.

The smaller shadow looked to his larger companion patiently, waiting for him to clarify these new arrivals _were _who they claimed to be. "They're all clean, no intruders that I can tell," Greyback elucidated, and took the final step forward to meet the newcomers. "You're late," he said gruffly.

"We had to make sure we weren't followed," the first newcomer said. All three of them were dressed in crimson, hooded cloaks which were drawn up over their heads. The disguises must have been for any potential invaders that might show up uninvited, however, since they knew Greyback was of a _species _that knew _exactly _what and who they were without having to see them. Just one whiff with the right wind told him (and hence his companion) who they were facing.

"Aurors were hovering around the entrance to Knockturn Alley, almost caught us on the way in to our apparition point. Still…" The first cloaked figure took a step forward, showing himself as the most important of them all. "We're here, now tell me just _why _you believe we would want to join with such…" His nose was twisted with a sneer that was visible to the golden eyed Greyback, even in the darkness, and the werewolf growled warningly.

"_Such_ what? You believe yourself above me you rotten, inbred little ponce?" Greyback snarled. His smaller companion surged forwards, seizing his arm, stopping him in his forward motion.

"Enough, Fenrir, I will handle this," he said carefully, before turning on their _guests. _"We do not have to see eye-to-eye, nor even _like _each other, good sir, but we have similar goals and as such…are _both _in need of a little more fire power. We have a proposition. You work with us and we will both walk away with what we desire."

The clearing was quiet but for the low waning cry of the wind, but then, the cloaked man spoke again. "Your business is with _who _exactly? The Potter boy is _ours _and our purposes for him are not for public knowledge. What can you possibly want that corroborates with Potter's capture?"

Fenrir grinned, his animalistic fangs _gleaming _in the darkness. He chuckled menacingly, but allowed his smaller companion to answer.

"Revenge," Fenrir Greyback's companion replied simply, his voice coarse with venom. "Revenge that will, in turn, make your prize of Potter ripe for the taking."

The rest of Harry's Saturday was a lonely one. He had donned his cloak and taken refuge in the Astronomy Tower until it was well past curfew. He knew it was his fault as much as theirs that he sat there in the darkness, invisible to any rogue passers-by, the loneliness slowly swallowing him whole. He knew it, but he also knew now how pointless it would be to return. For what purpose? To even further distance himself from them? No. He had tried to ask for help, they hadn't understood and it only strained their fragile friendship further by trying to make them.

So Sunday afternoon found him in the same place. Wrapped in his warmest robes with the invisibility cloak over him, shielding him from the world the way James himself might have done for him, or Lily, or Sirius… But they were gone, and he was still here, wasting their sacrifice.

_So who do I go to to fix myself? _There was no one else left. And the people surrounding him, they didn't understand how broken he was in the first place. _Malfoy _seemed to understand him more than them. He shivered at the thought.

"Feeling sorry for yourself still, Potter?" Came a voice from behind him. He half-turned, still concealed by the cloak and saw Malfoy standing a few feet behind him.

"I can't see you, but I can smell you," Malfoy clarified. I know that you're here, you may as well come out."

Harry remained still, turning slowly back to look over the landscape. The tryouts for the house quidditch teams would be held over the coming week, and while he couldn't try out he longed to feel the wind on his face again. Maybe he would go for a fly later? Or a walk into Hogsmeade? The Eighth years were allowed to travel into the village as they pleased…

"The rest of your golden trio are looking for you," Malfoy said, and Harry swore he saw him sniffing the air. _Trying to smell me out, _Harry thought with distaste.

"You haven't been at a meal since Saturday breakfast–"

"Which for you was, what? Bed-time?" Harry snarled, tearing the cloak off his head and tucking it into his robe pocket. "I came up here to be alone, Malfoy, _by myself._"

"Regardless, here," the blond stepped forwards, holding out a small package. Harry frowned, confusion and unease ebbing at the edges of his mind.

"Chocolate?" he said in disbelief. "What am I? Your girlfriend? What's that for?" He watched Malfoy scowl in reaction and the offensive offering was dropped into Harry's lap. It was a heavy block of what looked like insanely expensive chocolate.

"You and Professor Snape made me aware that when someone does something for you, you are obliged to be considerate in return," the blond said tersely. "I drained you and you haven't eaten since. You're reckless and irresponsible, I thought it more likely you would coat your empty stomach with chocolate as opposed to real food. You need the sugar if nothing else, I was merely acting–"

"Like a prat," Harry cut across him. "I don't know what you're playing at but just stop. You're a selfish arse, don't pretend otherwise."

A dark look overcame those grey eyes then. "So you say a man cannot and should not change?" Malfoy demanded.

Harry couldn't believe him. Why was he so determined to seek him out when he clearly didn't want him there? "Not in a few days, no," Harry said bluntly. "It's not honest or realistic–"

"I changed the moment that _thing _bit into me!" Malfoy hissed. "You're impossible, Potter. No wonder you're single. You demand a change in attitude and protest when someone tries to comply. Is it any wonder you're left to your solitude?"

Harry sneered. "Miracles don't happen in a day."

"You assume it is a miracle that I show another creature kindness?" Malfoy snapped back, gobsmacked. "Does it occur to you that even before the _'change' _ I had parents whom I loved, a home that I missed when I came to school, a pet I doted on? Just because you hate me, does that mean I can't have and feel all the same things you do?"

Harry scoffed, turning his head away. "You're dead," he murmured, "you can't feel anything."

Suddenly, so fast that it made Harry jump, Malfoy dropped to his knees, Harry's head shot up on instinct and his eyes met with those icy grey ones. Mere inches were between their faces now.

"Oh, I can feel," Malfoy purred. The sheer, silky tone of his voice made Harry shiver. "I can feel quite well. Better than you, I daresay, a person who cannot see the gift that is his own bloody life. A gift that many people have died to give him. No, you pretend it is worthless because then you don't have to change, you don't have to work at living. You give up. _So _easy, isn't it? Well, if so, then why are you stinking up the castle with misery?"

Harry's head was reeling. All of those accusations were conforming into a jumbled mess inside his head, a screaming, roaring labyrinth of chaos. He dropped his head, staring at the lump of chocolate in his lap as if it held the answers to these accusations.

"I know I'm not perfect, you _arse,_" Harry snarled, finding his voice. "And we may have some unfortunate similarities but I _did not _ask you to get involved in my life. You barged into it because _you _needed _me. _I allowed it to keep you alive but that doesn't mean you have a free invitation into my life."

Harry watched Malfoy tilt his head slightly when a light breeze rushed through the tower. He swore Malfoy was trying to _taste _him on it as he stared at him, considering his next words evidently. Harry just stared at him, _hard. _He didn't know why Malfoy was bothering to put on this façade of false consideration – he didn't even know what was even in it for the blond.

"It hurts doesn't it?" Malfoy said softly and Harry's brow creased with confusion. His skin prickled at the supple velvet the blond's tone had dropped to. His eyes flickered treacherously but he did not answer. He would not dignify Malfoy's prying with an answer.

"If it hurts, if you are on the verge of losing your friends, why are you being such a stubborn prat and keeping any hope of help out?"

Harry rolled his eyes at that. "Oh, Merlin, life advice from a vampire," he bit out sarcastically. "Are you suggesting that you're a _hope _for me?" he scoffed at the thought.

"_Look,_" Malfoy said through gritted teeth. "If it's my 'uncharacteristic chivalry' that's making you doubtful to the point of idiocy, you needn't worry. I have a selfish, vested interest in you staying alive. That's all. If you weren't integral to my survival I'd let you putrefy up here by yourself but I _know _that if you do that you'll die of loneliness or something else equally dramatic."

Harry sat quite still, unwilling to show Malfoy how those words were piercing him, like a thousand fiery needles in his weak flesh. It seemed like Malfoy had paused for dramatic affect, but still Harry refused to surrender his emotions to the prying vampire.

"And so here I am," Malfoy continued at last, his voice almost a reprieve from the silence, even if it was annoying. "I can't let you die, or I will. It's as simple at that."

It was then that Harry's body finally slumped in defeat. A low, exhausted sigh tumbled from his lips and then at last, when his eyes had fluttered shut, Harry spoke. "At least that was honest," he breathed tiredly. "I don't like being lied to, even if someone thinks it's for 'my own benefit'. I'm not a child, I can decide what I'm ready to hear."

Harry saw Malfoy raise a brow at that.

"You're a peculiar one, Potter," Malfoy murmured, "You'd prefer to hear the brutal truth rather than a sugar-coated one. What does it matter? I still have to keep you alive regardless–"

"It matters because I was lied to my entire life and I may not be able to control everything but I _will _control who I converse with," Harry cut across him, "I have no time for manipulative liars any longer."

Malfoy just shrugged. "I can understand that given your view, noble gryffindors are incredibly naïve. You believe everything can be solved by being only right and just."

Harry said nothing to this, but Malfoy kept gazing at him expectantly, as if waiting for him to retort hotly to his snide words. Having nothing to say and everything to think about, Harry gave another minute sigh, turning around to gaze out over the world once more. He felt Malfoy drop down beside him and his muscles tensed to flee but he managed to stay put.

Just then, the sun broke the thick canopy of clouds, the dazzling light beaming over his skin, warming him. Closing his eyes, Harry basked in it for a moment, before the slight sound of movement beside him reminded him that he was not alone.

His lashes fluttered and he reluctantly turned his gaze to Malfoy. His breath was stolen for a moment, throttled by a tightness in his chest and throat. The sun illuminated that pale skin, giving a soft glow to those cheeks and that halo of blond hair. When finally he found his voice, it wasn't as flippant as he would've like.

"You said that Snape invented a potion for you so that you could come out in sunlight," Harry said. "How did he help you? Aren't vampires supposed to turn to combust in the sun?"

Malfoy was quiet for a moment before the breath that was not keeping him alive shuddered over his lips in a sigh. "They don't turn to ash right away, it would burn slowly, like a sluggish acid eating at the skin. If the exposure was too long then death would be imminent, but it wouldn't happen like that – not like an explosion."

Harry nodded, no small part of him disturbed by the fact that he was having his first calm, civilised conversation with Malfoy, and it was about death.

"When I first returned home I was driven into hiding in my room by the sun. My world looked bleak at best, doomed to darkness," Malfoy's tongue darted over his lips to wet them and Harry flushed when he caught himself staring at that little pink organ. He winced at his own idiocy and averted his gaze to an apparently interesting patch on the stone floor while Malfoy continued.

"Severus spent most of the summer struggling to find a cure, but the best thing he could invent for me was a potion to give me some semblance of my life back. My life may be…dubious by anyone's standards, but I owe him every inch of it. A potion that if taken once a day gives me back some of my future. Or a chance at it at least."

Harry thought for a moment, finding Snape's first name peculiar at best on Malfoy's tongue. "He's done an awful lot for you considering you're just his student," Harry said, edging around insinuation. But when Malfoy didn't seem to comprehend, he was forced to continue. "Do you and Snape fancy each other or something?" The answer was quite clear from the almost nauseated look on Malfoy's face.

"That is quite possibly the most disgusting thing I have ever heard," Malfoy sneered. "Do you fancy that werewolf of yours?" he demanded. "It's the same principle. Severus has been a close friend of my parents since before I was born. I trust him with my life."

Harry snorted at that, recalling all of the times Snape had saved _his _life. "I trust him with mine too," he admitted, "but he's still a git."

Malfoy turned his head a fraction, Harry noted, now being watched out of the corner of one of those grey eyes. "By your standards so am I," Malfoy said.

Harry nodded. "You are that. But you're…more bearable when you're not trying to be something else."

Malfoy flashed a wily grin then. "When I'm being honest, of course, how perfectly naïve of you, Potter. Does it not occur to you that maybe it's all part of my plan to get you under my thumb?"

"I would never be under anyone's thumb," Harry said simply. Malfoy's grin twisted into a worryingly thoughtful look.

"Believe me, Potter," Malfoy said, honesty sounding odd in his voice. "that's the only reason you have any of my respect." With the sunlight bathing that pale face, Harry only just noticed how worn and tired Malfoy looked. _The way he looks about a day or so before he needs to feed, _he thought, confused. It had only been…what? A day? He'd gone even longer than recommended last time, why was he so worn already?

"You look a bit…well…_peaky, _more than you should do considering that it was only yesterday that we…I mean that I – well you know," he flushed at his own inarticulateness, and his pride was only saved by the fact that he hadn't come last time he had offered Malfoy his throat. "Shouldn't you be good until Wednesday night?"

Malfoy turned his head to avoid Harry's eyes. "That is not your concern," Malfoy said a bit too quickly.

"But…I read that sometimes a vampire might require more blood if he overexerts himself, if he engages in–"

"Your concern is touching but as I am dead I wouldn't spend too much time fawning over my health," Malfoy said stiffly, getting to his feet. Harry followed him up.

"For someone who is always saying _I _have a foul temper, you've got one to match," Harry said sharply. With that, he watched Malfoy turn and fly across the room and down the stairs, out of sight. He left Harry alone with his thoughts, his irritation. His life would become a lot easier if they could learn to tolerate each other at least. If they were forced together until Snape could find some sort of solution to Malfoy needing only _his, _Harry's blood, then it would be a lot less exhausting if they could be more cordial towards each other.

Malfoy stalked the corridors around the dungeons. Though he didn't live down here any longer, he felt at home here. It was also quiet and he needed silence right now. The halls, they were so noisy now with his vampire heightened hearing. His hands were curled into tight fists. The stolen blood was thumping in his veins, reminding him just how little was left. How infuriating that Potter notice his dilapidated state. He hadn't thought he'd need to come to an excuse, hadn't thought anyone would notice!

Professor Alaric had cornered him yesterday evening, and the torture that had followed seemed to have increased thanks to his successfulness in avoiding him up until that point. Though his superhuman body had healed all physical signs, Malfoy could still remember the agony that ripped through him and no doubt, he was in for more this week. After every defence lesson? Every time he roamed the corridor alone? Which was often? He only dared to walk here alone because he knew that the door to Severus's quarters were only just down the hall. He felt, safer knowing that, but not _safe. _Never safe.

He hated how pathetic he still was, despite what he was. He knew that the more of Potter's blood he drank, the quicker his vampire abilities would grow. But he didn't know that even that would help, if defending himself in any way could end in the world finding out what he was before he was ready. He could probably rip Alaric's throat out with his bare hand once his powers reached their peak. But that would be drawing attention to the presence of a supernatural creature in the castle, and then it was only a matter of time.

Besides, though vampires were politically acceptable, ripping someone's throat out was still quite illegal. And him, a death eater to boot. How could he do anything? How could he call out for help? To whimper and call for his mother and father as he had done so many times before. That cowardice wasn't part of who he was anymore. What scrap of pride he had left, he would cling to until he was nothing but dust.

However, up there in the tower teasing Potter, having (what he could only term as) a civilised conversation with Potter, when drank from Potter… It mattered little who it was with, he had felt _alive _with him as he never felt otherwise. Now, he could only dread the rest of his un-life. Hiding from a lunatic posing as a professor, who had some sort of vendetta against him and only him. And he could never tell anyone, if he hoped to keep his secret. He was doomed to this, this _un-life_ forever, with a few escapes from reality here and there, and only at Potter's hand…

_ Potter,_ he thought, _why couldn't it be anyone but Potter to give me this?_

_Stupid boy_, he admonished himself, wincing at each recollection of his guard dropping like a whore's knickers in Potter's presence. He had tried to hide this side of himself, the vulnerable portion of his soul that just wanted what everyone wanted. He wanted to not be afraid to go home, wanted to smile like he meant it, wanted to not have to guard himself and his dark secret against everyone in the world. He wanted to be _alive _not merely _breathing _in this pitiful existence. And heaven help him but those fleeting moments _did_ bring him perilously close.

When he reached the first landing on the spiral stairs, he swung his arms against the balustrade and leant on them heavily, closing his eyes so tight that he saw spots in the dark behind his eyelids. How had he fallen so simply from the place of estrangement he had worked so hard for? He had no friends. He confided nothing in his parents. He spoke nothing of his inner turmoil, betrayed nothing of his true self, and hadn't done since before sixth year. He ground his teeth, fists tightening until his knuckles were white. How did precious Harry Potter reach beyond his iron-exterior so effortlessly?

_Because deep down, you want him to, _a dark, vampiric voice cooed at the back of his mind.

Harry wasn't sure what it was that had drawn him from his seclusion and into the great hall for breakfast Monday morning, but he had a feeling the clenching hunger pains in his stomach had a lot to do with it. He had to face the world for lessons in any case today, he may as well feed his stomach and mind beforehand. He wouldn't gain anything by hiding upstairs for an extra half hour.

As usual, when Harry took his seat in the middle of a great gap, Hermione moved to shuffle up nearer to him. She said nothing, just nodded amicably before returning to her dippy egg. Ron was on the other side of her, but he said nothing either. And there was an obvious gap between himself and his friends. Two Dudleys could've fit there.

_Well you wanted solitude, _he thought, remembering Malfoy's words. They stung him as he stocked his plate with bacon an egg and some toast. His stomach churned longingly at the sight, having survived only on the chocolate Malfoy had given him yesterday. Yes, he'd eaten it. He didn't want to think on what that could mean either.

The hall was alive and vibrant with voices and yet he felt so very distant from all of their bubbly vitality. He grumbled to himself, dipping a mouthful of bacon and toast into the yolk of the egg before putting it in his mouth. Food didn't taste as good as it used to…

"Good morning."

Harry almost jumped at that, and not only because he recognised the voice, or because the _owner _of that voice had taken the gaping, obviously empty space across the bench from him. Mostly because it was the first kind word he had heard all morning, and it was from _Malfoy. _

Malfoy who had stormed off when their conversation ran deeper than bloodshed yesterday. Harry looked up at him, watching the blond sprinkle brown sugar over his porridge. "Morning," he said quietly, not wanting to look a gift horse in the mouth. If Malfoy was going to try and behave himself and make this impractical tension between them a bit more cordial, if Malfoy was going to talk to him, he wasn't going to stop him.

"Hungry today, Potter?" he asked, an edge of teasing to his voice. Harry raised a brow.

"Famished, you?" he replied, really wanting to ask _why _Draco was eating, he hadn't read anything about vampires needing real food as well. _All for appearances I suppose though, _Harry thought, taking another few, large mouthfuls of food. And if his table manners put Malfoy off anything remotely sexual, well, that was merely a bonus.

"What're _you _sitting near him for, Malfoy?" the familiar voice of Ron demanded from the side. Harry winced, preparing for what was to come.

"The seat was empty, Weasley," Malfoy replied coolly, with only a hint of a sneer. "Devoid of red-head, so unless my presence offends Potter, it's none of your business."

Harry did not have to turn his head to know Ron had gone pink and was grinding his teeth.

"Your _existence _offends _everyone_," Ron snapped. "Harry has enough to deal with, without you stinking up his perfectly good air."

Rather than leap to his feet in indignation, Malfoy merely took another mouthful of his porridge before replying indifferently. "Including alleged _best friends _who I have seen in his company all of three times since the train."

Ron snorted at that, an elbow from Hermione silencing him, Harry noticed.

"We aren't in first year anymore," Hermione said stiffly. "You shouldn't start a row over nothing. We've had enough fighting to last a lifetime. Malfoy was just _talking _to him, Ron."

"Exactly," Malfoy interjected, "no need to get jealous."

Harry winced at that.

"_Jealous_!" Ron cried indignantly.

"Ron." Hermione grabbed his forearm. "I for one think its very mature of Harry and Malfoy to set aside old rivalries and push on with the future. They are partners in both Charms and Defence now, you realise?"

Ron shrugged, evidently vexed that no one had taken his side. Harry felt more than slightly annoyed that they had scarcely spoken to him of late but felt as if they still had the right to stop Malfoy from talking to him. There was fault on both sides, of course, but then, if he was honest, Malfoy was the one who had been the most honest. As much as it hurt him to admit. He didn't deserve to be snubbed like that. Not lately anyway.

"Which reminds me, we're going to be in trouble with Flitwick," Harry said conversationally, looking into Malfoy's pale face unreservedly. And he didn't think the urge to talk to him stemmed _just _from the desire to irritate Ron, either. "We didn't work on Dual Casting." He shared a groan with Malfoy at that. It was oddly nice to feel normal for that moment. Even if it were over something bad, it was a _normal _bad; school, homework. When had they ever been his biggest problem? It was a refreshing change.

They had to wait until the final lesson to find out. But sure enough, Flitwick pounced on them the moment they were called upon to give the first demonstration before the class, and they simply looked at each other, uncertainly. Flitwick's little face twisted with both disappointment and anger. "I would have thought that two _men _could set aside their differences and be grown up enough to complete work set–"

"Forgive me, Professor," Malfoy interjected, surprising Harry with his next words. "It's my fault, I was preoccupied, I didn't spare the time for Potter to–"

"Regardless of whose fault it was," Flitwick cut across him, "You have both lived through a war, I expected more maturity and respect from you both."

The class was silent, particularly Harry, who was still reeling from Malfoy's act of taking blame which in truth, wasn't entirely his.

"We're sorry, Professor," Harry said at last, finding his words. He noticed then that, for some reason, Flitwick's expression softened a little.

"You will both make up the time in detention – tonight after dinner, is that clear?" the little Professor demanded. Both of them nodded and the lesson continued. The students were called up to demonstrate their dual casting in their pairs. A few were alright, but mostly either too heavy-handed or too feeble with their spells. They needed more practice to level with their partners. Harry paid a bit more attention when Ron and Hermione stepped into the centre of the room, before the class. Hermione was always quickest to learn a new spell, but Ron usually had trouble. It made for an interesting pair.

A frown creased Harry's brow. Hermione

had been quiet so far today, now she looked quite pale as well and Harry wondered if she wasn't feeling very well. He thought Ron was thinking the same too, he looked a bit apprehensive of letting her pressure herself even further. She looked so weak. But as ever, she was determined.

Both Hermione and Ron raised their wands – almost in unison and recited their spell – _almost _in unison. "_Wingardium Leviosa!_" The feather leapt up into the air with a sharp jerk instead of the intended gentle motion. Ron jumped and the feather was thrown completely under Hermione's power.

"Granger isn't right, Potter," Malfoy leant in and whispered in Harry's ear. Just in time, Harry refrained from flinching at his close proximity. He glanced to Malfoy, who was leaning worryingly close still.

"I can smell her sweat, the strain her body is under," Malfoy elaborated. Just as Harry turned his attention back to his friends, the feather in Hermione's usually practiced control combusted in a ball of flames.

"I'm so sorry Professor!" Hermione cried breathlessly. She looked like she might collapse and Harry was grateful when Ron began escorting her back to their desk.

"Not to worry, Miss Granger, it can happen when the two powers are unbalanced," he assured her, moving onto the next pair. But Harry looked to his best friends with concern. He was sure that it had been _Hermione's _powers that had been unbalanced alone, not the dual cast. Their notes from the previous lesson let him know that Hermione's concentration and connection with Ron would've compensated for any distortion. Something was wrong with Hermione.

"You said you could smell something was wrong with her?" he demanded of Malfoy in a whisper.

Malfoy inclined his head to look at him out of the corner of his eye as Flitwick began an instructive speech on how they could improve. "Your body is affected by every emotion or pressure you feel. I can smell it on her, she's worn, shaky, weary and determined to disregard her magic's way of telling her something is seriously wrong."

Harry cast a glance back to his friend, worried. "Is she ill?" A fraction of a nod was his answer. He swallowed hard. "But what is it that could've come on so suddenly? She needs to see Madam Pomfrey," Harry whispered, mostly to himself.

"But whether she will or not is anyone's guess," Malfoy replied. Before Harry could respond, Flitwick turned his attention to them and they were forced into silence for the rest of the lesson. Though Harry could feel Malfoy's eyes on him the entire time.

"This is serious!" Harry insisted when he caught up with Hermione and Ron as soon as Charms had finished. Hermione was adamant she was fine, of course, but how could Harry assure her of her predicament without revealing _how _he knew it was serious?

"You never make mistakes like that, _ever._"

"I _am _human, Harry, I am allowed to make mistakes without it being the end of the world," Hermione replied, going over her notes from Charms where they sat in the library.

"Since when?" Ron snorted. "Anything less than an 'O' and you implode with tears."

Hermione scowled.

"_Look_," Harry said, leaning across the table so that his lowered voice would still reach both her and Ron. Madam Pince was glaring at them from across the room. "What have you got to lose? Just go see Pomfrey and put everyone's minds at rest."

"I am not ill," Hermione said firmly. "I don't get ill and I certainly can't afford to this year – this is our last chance to repair the damage the war did to our futures." She sat back then to look at both him and Ron. Her face was flushed now, her fingers twitching slightly where they lay on the table atop her _'Dual Casting' _notes. "It may not mean a lot to either of you but it means something to me. I won't let…_Voldemort_have the victory of stealing any future I may have had. I studied hard for six years and I wont have them be made a waste."

"Your health is more important," Ron murmured.

"What good is it being healthy if I cannot do something with my life?" she snapped. "No. I'll hear no more of it. I _know _I am fine. I am simply not grasping _Dual Casting _as quickly as I might like, _however,_" she held up her notes, "That is why Ron and I will study harder for next lesson. I suggest you and Malfoy do the same."

Harry fell back in his seat, he would admit defeat on the subject for now and take it up with her again later. Perhaps when there was more physical evidence. He knew Malfoy's senses were faultless but he could not use him as proof without revealing his secret.

Malfoy. Harry didn't like the way he was unsure around Malfoy. He seemed to have a 'thing' where he told the truth, but Harry knew he only did so to get something out of it and couldn't figure out what that was.

"He's been flapping round you like a vulture," Ron grumbled bad-temperedly, "I don't like it, he's up to something."

Harry diverted his gaze from them guiltily, _just _catching Hermione's suspicious gaze as he did so. Part of him was irritated that they believed they had a say after weeks of neglect. But then, another part was grateful that they cared and didn't want to estrange them any more than he had already. He opened his mouth to reply, but Ron headed him off.

"Oh, great, there's the git now."

Harry frowned, craning his neck to glance in direction of the exit. There he was. Malfoy, as if timing his entrance, was striding towards their table at that very moment. _Very convenient, _Harry thought suspiciously, getting to his feet to intercept Malfoy.

"We have detention after dinner," Malfoy said casually, ignoring the glare thrown at him by Weasley and focussing on Harry as if he were the only one in the room. It made Harry nervous, that kind of concentration. No one looked at him like that, not ever. It was unsettling.

"I remember," Harry said, though he had actually forgotten the moment he'd seen Hermione's mystery predicament. "That's not for a few hours."

"Flitwick cornered me after Charms and said that we are both to report to his classroom after dinner for our detention. I thought I should inform you since we will be practicing our _Dual Casting _and I require your presence for that." Malfoy glanced to Hermione then. "Granger, you look positively feeble. You should get yourself to the Hospital Wing – there'll be no one to babysit Weasley if you drop dead."

Ron made to leap from his feet but Hermione laid a hand on his arm and shifted to look at Malfoy. "Thank you for the concern, Malfoy, but it is just a little stress, that's all. Nothing to write home about."

Harry sighed, anxiety creeping over his skin. Surely it must be something serious to affect her magic like that? And so soon? He noticed Malfoy step back a little then, and Harry wondered whether it was to escape Hermione's 'ill' aura or the scent of his, Harry's anxiety. Malfoy reacted badly to his negative emotions, he recalled, even that first time in the dungeon.

"Do you have any plans for the hours up until dinner?" Malfoy asked them (Harry) after a few moments of awkward silence.

Ron snorted in amusement. "Asking Harry on a date, are you Malfoy?" he chuckled.

Harry fought the flush that wanted to rise to colour his cheeks. "Shut it, Ron," he snapped, desperately avoiding Hermione's gaze. She seemed to be watching him for something, and he was pretty sure whatever it was, he didn't want her to see it. Licking his lips nervously, he snatched up his bag. "I'll see you two later," he said to both Hermione and Ron, turning and heading towards the library door. He felt Malfoy following closely, but it wasn't until they were in the empty corridor outside the library that he fell into stride beside him. Thankfully most of the school seemed to be out enjoying the rare flicker of sunshine.

"You don't seem to know what you want with those two," Malfoy observed, meaning Ron and Hermione.

"It's different from before. _I'm_ different. We're all trying to carry on like before when really we need to learn each other again," Harry explained thoughtfully, only realising just then that the words that had left his mouth without a conscious effort were in fact true. It felt obscenely eerie to be speaking so freely with Malfoy. Was this just a sympathy connection? He wished it would fade whatever it was. It wasn't right. He didn't _trust _Malfoy with his innermost worries and feelings, even if he required his blood to live.

"Why is it so difficult?" Malfoy asked.

Harry sighed, oddly (exasperatingly) touched by the interest, the near concern in Malfoy's silky voice. Whether it was because he needed Harry to live or not, it didn't matter at that moment. Besides, Malfoy needed him _alive, _yes, but he didn't need this, didn't need to care for his well-being and feelings.

Finally, Harry answered. "Because I'm worried we won't fit together anymore after everything that's changed."

Malfoy stared at him for a moment, then said, "that is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard. These two are some of the most flawed human beings in the wizarding world but they care about you faultlessly. You shouldn't piss that away, Potter, it's a rare thing." He paused, surveying Harry critically out of the corner of his eye, Harry cringed at the sense in his voice, shuddered against it. He couldn't understand Malfoy's purpose here.

"They followed you into the unknown, into a hunt for the Dark Lord," Malfoy continued, "it is preposterous of you to think they might abandon you _now_."

Harry shrugged. "Every human reaches the point where they can take no more," he said, heading out onto the moving stairs with his head lost up in a dark cloud of _when _his friends just might reach that point. He was paying no attention to where he was going. He stepped out onto the first landing and carried on walking without realising that the stairs were not there. He stumbled, his body fell forwards and his eyes flew wide. His stomach flipped. His entire body tensed for the long fall down countless flights of stairs.

Suddenly a sharp pain yanked at his arm, hauling him back and up, whirling him into a cool, vampire chest. He froze where he stood, wrapped tight in two strong arms. He vaguely realised there were a few people scattered around the countless moving staircases. But regardless, he couldn't move.

Harry's eyes were still wide, his breath coming out in frantic pants and his heart thudding wildly. Malfoy's slow, needless breath danced across his ear, reminding him that his blood was also racing madly, right under Malfoy's nose. Malfoy's breathing seemed purposeful, as if Malfoy were trying to stay calm even in the face of Harry's hot, pulsing blood.

"I believe you've soared above and beyond the point where you can take no more if you have such a death wish," Malfoy said smoothly. Briefly, Harry thought he felt long, smooth fingers gliding down his spine. Malfoy's clean, musky smell filled his nose, clouded his mind. In his silence, he could _just _hear the sluggish sound of that cool heart beating.

"You're…you're not…you don't need any…?" Harry tried but his words failed him. It was too awkward. Luckily Malfoy understood.

"No," he said, stepping away from Harry, who looked up at the blond thoughtfully. He really did look oddly paler than usual. Why wasn't the blood sustaining Malfoy for as long as he'd thought it would? He didn't look ravenous but he looked weaker, more tired than he should.

"My blood isn't lasting you as long," Harry said at last.

Malfoy raised a brow. "Are you offering more, Potter?"

Harry glared. "You absolute _arse_." He shoved back from Malfoy a few steps. "I was just _trying _to be… Look, just forget it," he murmured, turning and heading down the stairs that were now there waiting for him this time. He tried _not _to think about the presence of the lower years scattered around the staircases and how his and Malfoy's interaction must have looked to them just now.

"Where were we going?" he demanded when he felt Malfoy fall into stride beside him again. "You asked me to come with you."

"Actually," Malfoy corrected, "I asked you if you were busy, you flounced out to hide your embarrassment and I followed."

Harry growled under his breath, frustrated with Malfoy's easy, casual attitude. He was so comfortable with himself all of a sudden. Harry wasn't sure what to make of it. "Fine," he snapped, stopping as if to turn back on himself. "I'll just go back then and–"

"Don't be obtuse, Potter, for goodness sake," Malfoy griped, seized Harry's wrist to stop him from bolting. His hand was lukewarm, still not icy cold as it would be when Harry's ration of blood ran out of his system completely. "The lower years are having their tryouts down at the quidditch pitch. I was just wondering if you'd care to accompany me. We're both missing our favourite sport, I think."

That stopped Harry's mind dead.

"What's your game, Malfoy?" he asked with suspicion. He yanked his hand out of Malfoy's grasp. "Why are you being so–?"

"Don't start that again," Malfoy sighed exasperatedly. "I keep gracing you with my presence simply because you're necessary to my life and I need to ensure your depression doesn't eat you into an early grave. Not only that but if you _must _hear it, there's nobody else in this bloody castle besides Severus that I trust enough to even _exist _around any longer. Not to mention that you're the only tolerable one left in our wretched year. The war revealed to me just how _'good' _my old _'friends' _were."

Malfoy's words had been livid, frustrated and had escaped his lips in such a garbled rush that Harry had almost missed half of them. Almost. After a second of processing, he understood quite well and was taken aback by the unrehearsed honesty. The sincerity. He smiled sadly, thinking he could relate to a lot of what had just left Malfoy's mouth.

Then of course, there was the statement he couldn't ignore. "You trust me?" he asked, almost confused.

Malfoy stared at him, a look on his voice saying he hadn't remembered saying that part aloud. He scoffed then. "Of course, you're so bloody noble it's impossible you would betray my secret even if I ripped your throat out."

Harry brushed off the brash attitude and just continued to smile absently, carrying on down the stairs towards the outside. His shadow was absent for a moment. In fact he almost thought Malfoy had not followed until he stepped out into the fairly bright afternoon and felt the vampire's cool presence at his side, sliding in as if floating on the breeze. "You know, you'll get along with me easier if you just say it as it is," Harry said, walking towards the pitch. "I appreciate honesty more than pretty sounding lies."

"I'll remember that," Malfoy replied simply, the rest of their journey down to the pitch was silent. But oddly, it was a comfortable quiet that had fallen. Harry felt _almost _at ease as he hadn't been with _anyone _in over a year. And judging by Malfoy's matching awkwardness, he guessed it was just as unfamiliar territory for him as well.

The new recruits seemed enthusiastic if anything. There were dozens of second years and upwards lining up with hopes of being part of their house team. Harry gave a sigh of nostalgia. He missed quidditch. And by the way Malfoy was staring at the students dressed in silver and green, each eagerly anticipating their turn at trying out, he guessed that Malfoy missed it too.

"I'm sure I wasn't that small when I started," Harry mused, mostly to himself. Malfoy looked to him, again, that odd intensity in his eyes that Harry wasn't entirely sure of.

"No, you were much smaller and a year younger," Malfoy mused. Harry thought he saw a glimmer of amusement in Malfoy's eye when a second year slid back off his broom and onto his arse. "And ten times better," Malfoy added.

Thankfully, the rest of those trying out were also much better than that one lone second year. The sun was still high in the sky, but flicking in and out of the cover of clouds frequently. Suddenly, a sharp breeze whipped through the stadium and Harry shivered, pulling his cloak tighter around himself. It took him a moment to remember _why _Malfoy wasn't bothered by the cold.

"Isn't it weird?" Harry asked carefully. "Not being affected by the warmth or cold?"

Malfoy looked thoughtful for a moment before he answered. "I still feel the warmth, the cold, it just…it doesn't hurt me one way or another. The cold in particular I am used to. I am at best lukewarm most of the time. Except when I drink your blood of course."

A flush coloured Harry's cheeks and he turned his gaze to the potential recruits to avoid those eyes. He thought for a moment about those words, what they meant and why the sound of the intensity in that voice affected him so. His tongue danced out over his dry lips nervously, chancing speech. "What do I taste like?" Harry asked, not entirely sure he wanted to know the answer.

Malfoy tensed, he noticed, and it was a moment before he answered. "There is no specific taste," Malfoy explained, his voice oddly thick. "It tastes rich and sweet and…hot, like…like…I don't know, there is no comparison."

Harry's face was redder than ever now. He swallowed thickly. "That good?" he murmured dumbly.

"Everyone else's blood tastes like ash and real food tastes the same as…as when I was human, but I get nothing from it and so it has no appeal for me," Malfoy explained. "If I eat real food it's only for show or from habit. It doesn't give me sustenance and I cannot even digest it without your blood in my system." Malfoy was looking on him with that intensity again. "Without your blood I cannot function – it powers my dead organs."

"So you cant tolerate real food or…or anything without my blood?"

Malfoy nodded. "I cannot even absorb the potion Severus makes to protect me from sunlight without it. When I drink your blood, it does what mine cannot, it powers my body."

Harry thought for a moment. "So…if someone cut you–"

"My body would heal rapidly – as any vampire's does, but I would need your blood to be able to do that. Eventually I'd bleed my supply of your blood away in trying to heal myself, and I would need more sooner than perhaps was normal."

Realisation dawned on Harry then. His eyes widened and he stared at Malfoy. "Someone has been attacking you." It was a statement not a question. Malfoy tried to look confused, but Harry saw the flicker of fear in his eyes. "Who has been attacking you? That's why my blood isn't sustaining you for as long, isn't it?"

Malfoy snarled and got to his feet.

"Isn't it?" Harry demanded. "If you need more you can have more, but if we don't stop whoever it is from hurting you–"

A warning growl left Malfoy's throat and he turned to Potter with livid eyes. Fury struggled in vain to hide the shame. The fear. "I have no intention of asking for more than we already agreed, so do not concern yourself."

Harry watched him flounce away but sped after him. The blond wasn't going at vampire speed, so the pursuit was a short one beneath the empty bleachers. He caught up to him, seizing a wrist and whirling him round to face him. He wondered _just _how weakened by the nameless attacker Malfoy was if he was able to be moved by him, Harry at all. But that glare had not weakened. Those intense eyes glowed an ominous grey as they focused on him. Harry raised his chin a fraction. Obstinate as ever.

"You said you weren't too much of a coward to ask for help," Harry gasped, his chest heaving breathlessly after that sprint. "So _ask _me! Please! Let me help you–"

"You cannot even help yourself!" Malfoy snapped, stepping forward, spanning the gap between them until he had backed Harry into one of the wooden supports of the quidditch stands. Harry pressed himself as flat to the wall as he could. He was worried what would happen if they touched. The waves of power rolling between them were so potent he could _feel _them. Malfoy leant in closer, his futile breath skimming Harry's face. "How can you save me?" Malfoy hissed.

Suddenly, Malfoy's head tilted. His eyes flickered down to Harry's lips and then fluttered shut as his mouth descended over Harry's. The intensity _pulsing _from Malfoy's being, from the very air around them choked Harry, clogged his throat and made every muscle in his body clench. He pressed back into the wall so hard the wood dug into his skull and his lips parted with a little gasp of pain. It was enough to make Malfoy pause in his descent, so close that their lips were almost touching.

Harry's eyes were still open and he watched Malfoy's flicker again. Those shining grey orbs glistened with vulnerability, power and lust, all at the same time. With hunger and something completely foreign to Harry brewing there, a hairsbreadth from his face, he was only just aware of the cage Malfoy's arms had formed around his head, pressing into the support beam behind him.

A low, uneven breath left Harry's lips, breezing over Malfoy's slightly parted ones and Harry lifted his chin a bit, tempted for some reason to span the gap between them. There was a fire burning in his belly, spiralling up his core and bursting into an inferno in his chest. His heart was thudding wildly and he swore inwardly at it. Tempted, he was very tempted. It felt like an eternity they both stood there, _almost _touching, both considering crossing the line to who knew where.

Harry tilted his head a fraction again. Closing his eyes, he hovered there just a moment longer and then…

"Oi! Malfoy! Potter!"

They leapt apart. Blaise Zabini was suddenly standing there with a look of suspicion on his face. Harry knew his own face was red, his insides knotted with the humiliation the almost-kiss had left him with. Malfoy was motionless, dangerously so.

"What is it, Blaise?" Malfoy asked, his voice ripe with irritation, his jaw set.

"Flitwick asked if you and Potter could report to the empty Charms classroom beside his office for your detention – said something has come up and he's asked someone to substitute in supervising you for your detention."

Harry frowned. "Snape, I bet, perfect." He pulled the fur-lined robe tighter around him as a chill tore through him. "Err…thanks, Zabini, I s'pose." He looked uncertainly to Malfoy, not quite meeting his eyes. "Shall we go?"

Malfoy said nothing in reply, simply nodded and lead the way towards the exit of the stadium. Zabini's voice froze them both in their tracks. Again.

"You two are awfully chummy these last few weeks," the once-slytherin accused, studying them with critical eyes. He was assessing their closeness, Harry was certain of it and he shuffled back from Malfoy as inconspicuously as possible.

"We only have ourselves to please," Malfoy snapped, his words as sharp as a viper's bite. "We have no one else to answer to, least of all _you_, Blaise." With that, Malfoy turned and marched ahead, Harry close behind. Harry did not relish the chance to find himself alone with the suspicious ex-slytherin after all. Zabini always had been unnervingly peculiar…

The sun was fighting a losing battle with the clouds for most of their trek back up to the castle, until finally as they reached the main courtyard, it fell behind a veil of grey. Harry followed for once, sneaking a glance at Malfoy's face every so often, striving to assess the situation. But Malfoy's face was cold and empty, nothing there but death and unhealthily white skin. Harry couldn't tell either way. Eventually, however, he could take the uncertainty no more.

"What was that?" Harry asked cautiously. Malfoy kept walking but his expression twisted with a grimace. Awkwardly, Harry continued. "I…I think we almost…" He flushed, not for the first nor last time that day. He was eighteen and he had _done _it but he couldn't _say _it. He kept seeing Malfoy's eyes shining with want, feeling those lips hovering over his own. It had felt so different to the silly adolescent kisses he'd shared with Ginny and Cho. It had still been clumsy and awkward but at the same time…

_It was better than anything I've felt before and we didn't even touch! _

Harry blinked, trying to veil his thoughts. He had _definitely _not just thought that about an _almost kiss _with Draco Malfoy.

"Even I know you've kissed before, Potter," Malfoy said rigidly, not stopping. "It could hardly be avoided forever when my entire body does nothing but _crave _another _taste _of you every minute of every day. I'm cursed, with you, _wanting _you – _needing _you. I can never live without you and it's not a matter of choice it's a matter of force."

Harry stopped dead staring at Malfoy's back as he too paused mid-step. Malfoy, seeming to realise what he'd said, turned to face him. A flicker of regret was in those eyes, but that did not permeate the mask of indifference he didn't dare let fall.

"It's not my ideal either," Harry hissed, "but if there's anything I've realised in the last few years it's that some things are inevitable and when moaning about it gets you nowhere, there really is no point in it." His fingers curled into his palms, biting into the skin there with hurt and anger. A fine mix. "Aren't you one of the people that told me that?" Harry demanded hotly.

Malfoy met his eyes thoughtfully then, his own face bitter but not touched by anger. "No, I agree I…I lost myself for a moment, that's all."

"Which time?" Harry bit out harshly, studying that pale, shaky mask for a crack, a ripple in its calm surface. He saw two gaping weak spots in those darkened eyes, the ones that had been so full of fire a moment ago, now dwindling. A familiar silence fell over them, in which the betrayal Harry felt in his chest gave him the courage to speak frankly. He had almost let his guard down with Malfoy there, and he had paid for it.

"It must be so repulsive for you to consider touching me at all. It must make you sick that you have to drink my blood," Harry snarled. "Is it so hard to separate your hunger for my blood from a delusional hunger for _me_?"

A ripple of unease rushed through the dead man before him. "Yes," Malfoy breathed honestly, uncertainly. He startled Harry with his candour and the ease in which he had come to it so greatly, that Harry stumbled back a little. Harry's tongue darted over his lips and he thought distantly that he could taste Malfoy's cool breath there.

"Is your interest in me only because you pity me?" Malfoy countered with his own question, his voice harsh with discontent.

Harry considered the tense feeling in his chest, his _gut _and gave a sigh of defeat. "No," he replied, his voice still stiff, "not entirely. Confused?"

A small smile broke Malfoy's mask and he stepped towards Harry, slowly, smoothly, until they were close again. But not like before. This time, Malfoy was more subtle about the way he inhaled Harry's smell, as if trying to see if Harry was worth more than just a food source. But not only did Harry see his 'scenting' but he also saw the reflection of his own confusion in Malfoy's face.

_Funny how you can find empathy, similarities even in your enemies, _Harry thought distantly, all conscious awareness whisked from his mind as Malfoy's breath touched his face, a cool, awakening breeze.

"Very," Malfoy answered then, his voice as husky as it had been before the almost kiss. "So let's just leave it at that for now."

Harry gave a jerky nod. He didn't have anything with Malfoy, not a friendship or even affection, just…a connection, one that he couldn't begin to understand. He couldn't say he really cared for Malfoy even, but he cared about him, he cared what happened to him. And he was grateful that they were similar in their confusion as well as a few of their darker attributes. He couldn't even give _himself _an answer to the simplest of questions involving the vampire right now, much less give them to Malfoy himself.

Then there was _that_ gigantic spanner in the works; Malfoy was a vampire. They were drawn together purely from Malfoy's need for his blood. Nothing more. And he needed more than that. Besides which, there were too many factors to consider, too many thoughts and reasons not to trust the vampire rattling around in his head. It was overcrowded in there right now, his doubts so deafening it made him wince. He was getting a headache.

"We have a detention," he said, trying to find a way out of the uncomfortable situation they had fallen into once again. He felt he had lost himself for a while this afternoon and he wasn't certain that he liked that, that he liked how Malfoy was wheedling into his life.

Malfoy glanced up at him from where his head had bowed, seemingly only just remembering that fact. The real world. "We do," Malfoy agreed.

_~To Be Continued..._


End file.
